


Dis-ease

by yoonginkk



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, Dangan Ronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc
Genre: Alternate Universe - Different Mastermind (Dangan Ronpa), Gen, I Am Sorry, Mastermind!Makoto, Non Original Idea lol, Non-Despair Enoshima Junko, POV First Person, Personality Swap, Protag!Junko, Reverse roles, Spoilers for THH, i will someday dw, long chapters, no editing, probably discontinued idk
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-01
Updated: 2021-02-19
Packaged: 2021-03-10 05:08:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 157,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27768802
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yoonginkk/pseuds/yoonginkk
Summary: Bascially an AU where Junko and Makoto switch places.
Comments: 12
Kudos: 84





	1. Prologue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to Hope's Peak Academy.

Night.

Eternal night.

Even if I closed and opened my eyes, I could not escape the angry wrath of this moonless despair. Like a thick, inky tide, it swallowed me until my head was drunk with darkness and my heart was squeezed free of any light. My mind stumbled, uncoordinated with my body, and lingered dangerously close between the borders of consciousness and unconsciousness.

I could not tell whether I was asleep or awake, as I wasn't even sure if I was truly alive at this point. I could no longer hear the sound of my own breathing, or feel my chest gingerly rise up and down with each inhale and exhale I took. The only sensation I could feel was the freezing, stilling numbness of uncertainty and fear.

I laid perfectly still, anxiously waiting for the cold arms of death to embrace me, when my eyelids crept open at last.

The sight of light was now foreign to me after spending so long drifting in darkness, and I blinked with vigor in an attempt to adjust. Once my vision had been fully restored by my desperate endeavors of blinking and rubbing my eyes, the new world surrounding me came into view. 

At first, my mind was paralyzed with confusion on my whereabouts. It was still too dim for my tired eyes to distinguish any details, but I could faintly make out the blurry outlines of a desk. One desk quickly multiplied into several, to the point where there were too many for my dizzying head to count. This must be a classroom: what other room would house this many wooden desks?

But I had never visited this classroom once before. The dark, sketchy brown walls were unfamiliar and unpleasant to the eye, and I quickly found myself feeling trapped inside. Not to even mention the firm, rusty iron plates covering up any signs of a window. I needed to exit this haunting classroom as soon as possible, I thought to myself with a panic. 

But it took quite some while for my body to obey my mind's orders, as I seemed stuck in the seat of a hard wooden desk. I tried to lift my head from my folded arms, but it proved to be too heavy for me to do so. Against my will, I kept my head lying on top of the surface of the desk, and waited impatiently for my strength to return to me. Slowly, I could feel my mental and physical bodies piece together, until I was free from the strange, numbing, chilling grasp of fear and despair. I could now move and flex my fingertips, comb down my unruly hair, and lift my head from the desk. 

On shaky, trembling legs, I leisurely stood up from my seated position. My knees were weak and soft, as if all of my nerves had been frayed clean. I discovered with displeasure that I needed to hold onto the rough corners of the desks to stabilize myself and walk. Gripping the edges of the tables tightly, I squinted under the dim lighting of the empty classroom and tried to navigate my way out of the room. 

As I stumbled in the dark like a drunk, high heeled woman, my eyes uncovered a note sitting prettily on top of the teacher's desk, looking rather presentable and pristine. With questions swarming up inside my head, like fish in a whirlpool, I groped my way towards the front of the classroom, nearly losing my balance on the way there.

The teacher's desk was empty, besides the piece of paper that perched on top of it. A thin layer of dust was settled on the smooth surface, suggesting the possibility that this was an unused classroom for some time. If so, I wondered, then why am I here? Where am I? What happened? 

I was supposed to be attending my first year here at Hope's Peak Academy as a freshman. Yet, on merely the first day of school, I found myself in a very scary and confusing situation that left me feeling quite hopeless and frightened. I had enough questions to last a lifetime, but no answers, much to my dismay. Perhaps, I reassured myself, that the note on the teacher's desk was one. So I stretched an outreached hand to pick up the delicate piece of paper.

Once I carefully unfolded the note, I found something very surprising indeed waiting for my eyes.

The note appeared to be scribbled on with an array of colorful crayons and colored pencils. The handwriting was untidy, almost ineligible, like a learning child's penmanship. Orange suns and green grass were drawn on the snowy white paper. Pinks, reds, yellows, and blues formed block and cursive letters of all sorts, spelling out a mess of words that I could only decipher as, "Meet in the Main Hall at 8!"

Then, underneath, "Don't be late."

"Is this some kind of joke?" I heard myself mumble these soft words. I turned the note around to scavenge its back, but got nothing in return. Shaking my head, I realized there was nothing more to this piece of paper. I was disappointed, to say the very least. The whole thing seemed a bit childish, yet unsettling at the same time. It seemed as if I had no other choice but to follow the note's instructions. I could only imagine what would happen if I stayed inside this dingy, dusty room for any longer.

Placing the note back onto the desk, I straightened my back with a hopeless sigh. As much as I feared the unknown, I could not bear to stay here. Perhaps some kind of clue laid outside for me. It was worth a shot, at least. I grimaced and pivoted myself on my heel to approach the door of the classroom. I needed to arrive at the main hall, according to the note. So, using both hands, I pried the heavy, sliding door open and slipped outside into the dim hallway.

It appeared far too dark and empty to be a school hallway. As I cautiously paced through corridor after corridor, I wondered, where were the other students? Surely, they should be here too. It was the first day of high school, and I could not see myself being the only person attending. After all, I did some research on my fellow classmates shortly before I arrived here, and they all seemed like normal Ultimate students. They wouldn't miss a day of school, would they? At least, not here at Hope's Peak, the most prestigious academy in all of Japan. There are kids willing to sell their house to spend a semester here. Hopefully, they were all gathered in the main hall, waiting for my arrival. But that was only my guess. 

Without waiting to ponder my suggestions any further, I rounded a faintly lit hallway, maneuvering through many lonely pillars that stood in the corridors. Darkened signs pointing directions were my only sense of navigation, and the hollow echoes of my heels were my only companion. Being completely and utterly alone in such a disturbing place haunted me to the bone, and I could feel the hairs on the back of my neck rise up. My footsteps grew faster and louder, like the breaths of someone being hunted and chased, as I traveled from one hall to another. Rubbing my bare arms with my palms, I attempted to generate some heat to settle my jumpy nerves as I sighted the main hall. 

The huge, towering doors were slightly ajar, hinting that someone was already inside. Whether that fact reassured or chilled me, I decided I would that find out for myself. 

And so, I shouldered my way inside, heart in my throat.

Fourteen students.

Fourteen.

Ultimates.

Already inside.

I let go of a breath that I wasn't even aware I was holding, and it quickly transformed itself into a sigh of relief.

"Woah, hey! Another new kid!" A male voice without a face exclaimed at once, eagerness and excitement in his words. I tried to scour through the thick crowd in an attempt to find the owner of the voice, and discovered it to be a tall, brown skinned boy with disorderly, dark dreadlocks. 

"So, counting her, that makes fifteen of us," Another male student, considerably larger and rounder than the last, muttered. He pushed the small, round framed glasses higher up his stubby nose in deep consideration. "Seems like a good cut-off point, but I wonder if this is everyone."

"Everyone..." My voice naturally trailed off into a murmur as I did a mental count of all the heads inside the vast hall. "Then, you guys are all..."

"Yeah, we're all new here." A short, doll-like girl with layered light brown hair standing at the front of the crowd agreed. "Today's supposed to be our first day of class."

The first day of class, I pondered. How peculiar for a first day. This must be some kind of entrance exam, or opening ceremony. But that doesn't explain why I was asleep in an abandoned classroom, or how there's only one class at this school. More questions began to rapidly pile inside my head, so quickly that I could not even find words to spell them out. 

"You!" A dark, short haired boy dressed in a perfectly ironed white uniform pushed his to the front. Pointing a stern finger at me, as if a teacher, he yelled, "The note said not to be late! Do you have any excuse for your tardiness?" 

I could not recover any words to reply on time, so he simply shook his head like a disappointed parent. Embarrassment crept up on me, and suddenly, I regret spending more time than needed inside that dusty classroom. I managed to squeeze out an apology, but he didn't seem to catch it, and instead, another student spoke up.

"Jeez! Stop scaring her, you moron, and shut up for once." A tall, bulky, melanin stained boy with a dark brown perm barked in response, visibly irritated. His lavender eyes narrowed like a predator preparing to hunt its prey, illuminating quite a threatening aura that I decided to avoid from now on.

"Everyone, just calm down!" A darker skinned girl with a long brown ponytail and a short build said. "Listen, why don't we all go around and introduce ourselves?"

"Huh? Introductions?" Came a complaint from a tall, fiery haired boy with multiple piercings. He pressed his back against a grey pillar inside the main hall with a look of exasperation across his face. "Can we just find a way outta here already?"

Another girl, one with pale skin and black, twin hair drills, chuckled politely into her hand. "Maybe, but it may be good to at least find out who we all are before digging into the bigger problems here."

I tried to refrain from being intimidated by the rest of the class. Simple introductions wouldn't hurt anyone, right? As long as we were all together, I felt no need to be frightened by this school anymore.  
  


"Alright then! I'll start off!" The same, dark haired boy that lectured my tardiness volunteered without hesitation. "I'm Kiyotaka Ishimaru, the Ultimate Moral Compass. I believe in bold simplicity! Let's work together on our educational crusade!"

I recognized him from the many community projects he organized from the Public Morals Committee. Amazing grades, honor student, perfect student record. There was nothing he could not do. From the way his ruby red shined with brilliant determination, I had no trouble doubting that he was the Ultimate Moral Compass.

"Anyway, you can call me Taka." He continued with perfect ease in introducing himself. Turning to me, he inquired, "What is your name? Don't tell me it's Miss Tardy."

He and I both laughed at the joke, although mine was more of a nervous one. I felt quite called out like that, especially because every pair of eyes were now trained on me rather than Kiyotaka.

"Um, I'm Junko Enoshima," I said. "Ultimate Fashionista."

I am certain that almost everyone knows my name, or at the very least, my face. Being the Ultimate Fashionista, my face has been plastered on the front of magazines and billboards and newspapers. I have been modeling ever since I was out of elementary school, evolving from cute children's winter clothes to the newest, hottest accessories. It was no surprise from me that many faces lit up inside the main hall.

"Y-You're Junko Enoshima?" A girl with pale skin and dark purple braids stuttered quietly from her corner of the room. She seemed to be cut off from everyone else in the group, peaking my interest in her. I smiled.

"Charmed, I'm sure." I said with a light laugh. "And you are?"

"N-Not like someone like you will remember my n-name anyway, but," she swallowed dryly. "I'm T-Toko. Toko Fukawa."

Despite being a busied fashionista, I've found time to read plenty of books, so I immediately recognized that name, just as she did mine. "Toko Fukawa? The Ultimate Writing Prodigy?"

She did not reply with words, but rather a small, timid nod of her head. She refused to make eye contact with me, and instead looked to the ground where the white hem of her long, purple school uniform met the floor.

"Wow! In the flesh!" I exclaimed with ecstasy. My eager voice seemed to frighten her a bit, so I toned down my excitement. "I love your book, "So Lingers the Ocean!"'

"Y-You do?" It was now her turn to be surprised. "What a s-shocker."

I tried to mention that her book was such a success amongst my female coworkers, who had now fallen head over heels with fishermen, but she seemed to not be listening any longer. I assumed that was the end of our small conversation.

Luckily, another female voice pulled me straight from the remains of my previous discussion. This time, it was a long, navy haired girl dressed in a neat blue and white seifuku school uniform. Her bangs were held back with two simple, white clips. She smiled cheerfully at me and waved in a friendly manner.

"Hi, I'm Sayaka Maizono, the Ultimate Pop Sensation. I look forward to getting to know you!" She greeted.

I didn't need an introduction to know who she was. Sayaka Maizono was a lead singer in a popular girl idol group all across Japan. Quite similar to me, her face was all over magazine covers and TV broadcasts, often for her new album, or a dance performance with her group. No matter, she was all over the media for being a talented young performer, and it was rather unbelievable that she was in the same class as I.

"It's nice to see someone else who knows fame first hand," she sighed deeply, shaking her head. "Everyone thinks it's all sunshine and rainbows, but the industry's really tough and gritty. I'm sure you know."

She smiled at me; it was a knowing smile, a sisterly one, as if she could read through all of my cluttered thoughts and still manage to understand.

"Don't be so tense! We'll all be fine." She spoke the exact words I desired to hear. It was amazing, really.

As I tried to fish for a response inside my littered mind, the red headed boy who had complained about introductions strolled forward to greet us. He flashed a dazzling smile that was slightly crooked and ran a hand through his spiky hair.

"Yo! The name's Leon Kuwata, the Ultimate Baseball Star. What's up, ladies?" He said admirably. But I didn't need a domestic introduction to recognize that name: he was Leon Kuwata, an exceptional teenage baseball hitter who made the news for competing in the national high school champs with his team. Every time I would turn on the sports section of my TV, I would always hear the infamous name of Leon Kuwata.

Yet, despite being all over the television for his extraordinary baseball skills, I had some trouble recognizing the face in front of me.

"Huh? _You're_ Leon Kuwata?" Sayaka questioned with the same amount of surprise as I held. He gave her a puzzled, almost embarrassed stare in return.

"What's wrong?" He answered her inquiry with another question. Sayaka seemed to automatically regret ever asking, as she began to wave him off dismissively with a small laugh.

"N-Nothing! I'm just...surprised." She said, carefully choosing her correct words in order to avoid hurting him.

"Yeah, I figured with you being the Ultimate Baseball Star and all-" I began to agree with her statement.

"What, were you expecting some kid with a shaved head?" He shook his head, visibly despirited. "I didn't have a choice, okay? Shaving your head is like, part of national championship regulations!" 

I was expecting more of a traditional looking, sporty guy to be the Ultimate Baseball Star, like one of those adult, professional players in stadiums. But the person standing in front of me looked more like a teen punk star, with abnormally spiky red hair and dozens of silver piercings, than a baseball player. He certainly dressed the part: with his white blazer, bearing a popped collar, and red splattered shirt, alongside the many chains hanging from his hips, he looked anything but a baseball star.

"But your head isn't shaved right now." Sayaka mentioned, quite bluntly as well. 

"Well, I totally quit baseball as soon as I got accepted here," Leon sheepishly admitted. I felt my eyes grow wide on my face in disbelief, but my tongue offered no words to express my shock. "My only path in life is getting into music! You can feel that star-quality aura I have, right?" He continued, sounding more confident this time.

Sayaka's face lit up with passion. "Music! I love that too!" She agreed enthusiastically. "Maybe I can help start your music career once we're out of here!"

Leon broke eye contact. "I'm actually more into rock music, you know? Like, with electric guitars and stuff?" He quietly added on to tone down her excitement.

"Well, I can still help! Lemme see if I can find a good label for you.." She began to think deeply. Her blue eyes showed great fervor, and I was impressed by how deeply in love she was with music.

I slowly left the two alone to talk about singing in search for a new conversation. There were still many more classmates to greet, and I could not linger on one for too long if I wanted to make progress.

The person standing closest to my right was the round boy from earlier, who had first made a note about the number of people here. He had short black hair that curled to his round cheeks and thick, circular glasses. I decided to approach him first.

"I am Hifumi Yamada, the Ultimate Fanfic Creator. But if you want to call me by my nickname, "The Alpha and the Omega!"," he exclaimed without hesitation. "I don't mind."

"Nice to meet you, Hifumi," I tried to form a sentence, but he cut me off as quickly as he had started.

"By the way, how much does a girl like you know about the world of 2D art?" He suddenly interrogated me, small eyes dark with interest. I instantly stepped a foot back from the unexpected question being launched at me.

"World of...2D art?" I repeated in an attempt to voice my confusion. He looked as if impatient at my lack of knowledge, and huffed a heavy breath.

"In this world, I am considered a mere fanfic creator, but in that world, the one of 2D, I am known as a complete legend!" He claimed, almost arrogantly. Regarding my frozen, puzzled expression, he continued, "Do you not believe me? I once sold ten thousand copies of one of my fan comics at a school festival. The event has passed into legend..."

Ten thousand copies of mere fan art, I thought to myself. It was unquestionably impressive for a high school student to achieve. He was not known as the Ultimate Fanfic Creator for nothing. I know that art and writing takes hours at a time, so I paid my deep respects to someone as committed as him. 

"If you want to read some of my work later on, just tell me, Miss Enoshima," he chuckled, clearly knowing something I did not. "My art is full of the deepest meaning."

"Sure thing." I quickly reassured him before he could continue asking me things I lacked comprehension of. Perhaps now is a good time to find another student to greet. There were still plenty left in the main hall, some appearing more approachable than others. I turned to face another group of five Ultimates that I had not met with yet, and decided to start my journey from there.

The short, brown skinned girl with a ponytail seemed to be one of the more friendly students, judging from her statement earlier on about starting introductions. I weaved my way through the thick crowd of students to find and talk to her.

As expected, she was warm and amiable with her introduction, showing no sign of discomfort or disgust towards me. In fact, she conversed as if we had been friends for a while beforehand. Smiling, she started, "Heya! I'm Aoi Asahina, the Ultimate Swimming Pro! But my friends just call me Hina. 'Sup?"

"Junko Enoshima." I returned her smile.

"Wow, I can't believe _the_ Junko Enoshima is talking to me right now!" Her eyes widened in utter incredulity. "I've only seen you on my favorite magazines and cosmetics. You're so famous!"

"You're certainly one to talk," I politely argued. "You're all over media right now for your Olympics performance! Which was amazing, by the way." She waved me off with modesty. "If anything, you're the famous one."

She was surely as easygoing and welcoming as she appeared. I was rather glad to know someone could easily be considered a friend in this haunting place. Maybe things won't be as bad as I originally thought, as long as I got to know everyone here.

Next to Aoi was the short, brown haired girl in a dark green jacket with white accents and a large brown skirt. She seemed to be just as kind as Aoi, perhaps just a bit more timid and shy, but it wouldn't hurt anyone to go talk with her, right? 

I tried to appear calm and approachable as I made my way through.

"Hello," she greeted softly as I walked forward to face her. "I'm Chihiro Fujisaki, the Ultimate Programmer. Nice to meet you." 

I recognized that last name: Fujisaki. Taichi Fujisaki, Chihiro's father, I presume, was a well known software engineer who created cutting edge programs and technology that advanced even further than the modern day computer. Some claim that Chihiro's progamming skills exceed even her father's, and has created functioning, exceptionally intelligent AI, and even helped develop a virtual reality world. Whatever it was, she was undoubtedly skilled in computer science, and even has a fanbase of her own.

"Nice to meet you, too." I said in return. 

"Hey," she added, her tone shallow and meek. I simply tilted my head to gesture her to continue. "A-Are you upset with me?"

"Huh?" I raised my eyebrows in shock, racking my brain in a desperate search to see if I had previously said something wrong. "N-No, not at all! I was just lost in thought about something."

"Lost in thought?" She echoed my uncertain words, and I felt immediate regret. Perhaps I was acting strange, or I had said something offensive. I scolded myself at once.

"Yeah! It has nothing to do with me being upset or anything." I reassured her, hoping that I did not upset her too much. She sighed with great relief at my answer and smiled brightly at me.

"Oh, that's good. I was afraid maybe you didn't like me." She admitted. Her cheeks were rosy with consolation when she added, "Well, I look forward to getting to know you better, Junko!"

"Same here." I concurred, glad that we started well on good terms. As shy and self conscious as she seemed, Chihiro was quite a nice person, a good hearted one at the very least. I figured I could trust her, just like Aoi.

The next person to my right appeared to be the exact opposite of the last two. A slender, pale girl with long, light purple hair and piercing lavender eyes had a face of stone. Emotionless and mysterious, she did not seem the type to open up easily. She stood independent, silent, still, like a menacing sword struck in a boulder, waiting for the day to strike. If someone were to disturb, she would not hesitate to fight back. She intimidated yet intrigued me at the same time.

"Um, can I ask you your name?" I attempted to start up a conversation, but my endeavors were all fruitless, as she remained wordless and deep in thought. I stood and waited for her answer, my curiousity peaking with each second that ticked by.

"My name is Kyoko Kirigiri." She stated, as if giving a business telephone number. Unlike the previous students, there was no mention of an Ultimate talent, bringing my full attention onto her.

"So, um," I found difficulty in forming the right words. "What are you doing here at this school?"

Her gaze was icy and demanding, as if she were interrogating me at a police station. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"No, I just meant..." My voice stumbled and faltered. "Getting invited here means you're some kind of "ultimate", right? So what kind of ultimate are you?"

She did not respond, but rather stared into the distance, as if trying to recall a long lost memory. I don't remember ever seeing her face, or hearing her name on any news site, which was odd for an Ultimate student. Usually, everyone is well known for their special talents, and the world completely fawns over them. But this girl seemed to be unknownst to the people, and I hadn't a clue on who she was. 

"Why should I tell you?" It sounded more like a statement than a question, like she was trying to force me into silence. 

"Huh?" I was caught off guard by here forceful answer. Was she protecting a secret of some sorts? It seemed as though she didn't want to reveal anything other than her name. Or maybe, she didn't know anything other than her name. "Well, I guess you don't have to tell me."

"No, I don't." She agreed. "So I'm not going to tell you."

I tried my best to recall such a name like Kyoko Kirigiri, but I ended up in vain. I have never heard of her before, and my mind could only imagine what kind of person she really is. If her talent was so important as to hide, I should be more wary of her in the near future. 

Moving on from her, I turned on the base of my heel to face the next student. Contrasting heavily from Kyoko's cold, mysterious aura, was a boy.

I did not have any other words to describe him: he was just a teenage boy, around my age and height. He had spiky brown hair that bore a prominent ahoge and wore a dark green hoodie paired with a black blazer. He had deep green eyes that were friendly as he scouted me. He was ordinary, almost too ordinary to even be real. No ultimate ability I could think of matched him, and I was forced to consider the posibility that he had no talent.

"Hi, I'm Makoto Naegi." He greeted me with a wave of his hand. "I guess you can call me the Ultimate Lucky Student."

"Ultimate Lucky Student?" I mirrored. He let out a small yet difficult laugh, almost as if embarrassed by his own words, and looked to the ground.

"I won a raffle sent by Hope's Peak Academy to chose a random, normal student to attend school here," he explained it all so smoothly, it was like he rehearsed beforehand, as if he knew he would be questioned. "Other from that, I don't really have a talent."

"I see." I said, nodding my head slowly to show my comprehension. That explains why the face and name were both new to me. He seemed like an average kid, nothing like the rest of the Ultimates. Unlike the others, there was nothing on the news talking about him, or anything special like that. 

Although bearing no talent of his own, he seemed friendly and optimistic, quite similar to Aoi, but also a bit awkward and unfamiliar. Just like any other high school boy on the first day of school, I assumed. 

"Well anyway, I hope we get along." He continued with a sheepish smile, as if he thoroughly understood my thoughts. 

"Same here." I conceded, figuring that would be the end of our small discussion of sorts. I left him to converse with Kyoko, who seemed rather curious in talking with him, as I spotted the next student in the crowd. When I did, though, I almost turned right back to where Makoto once stood, as I felt immediate dread at the sight of the tall, permed boy, who had yelled at Kiyotaka earlier.

He must have caught me staring at him unusually, because he raised his hung head to meet me in the eyes and said, "Name's Mondo Owada. Ultimate Biker Gang Leader. Nice to fuckin' meetcha."

Mondo Owada, the current leader of the largest biker gang in Japan, was standing right before my very own eyes. He seemed even more intimidating up close; I made a mental note to not set him off the wrong foot, or else I could find my own body tossed in the garbage disposal.

Although overawing, I've heard many great things about him. He has earned loyalty, respect, and admiration from every biker there was in the world ever since he became leader. It has been mentioned that he would keep any promise there was, no matter the cost. Even by his own life, he would stand by that promise between men, and never would allow it to shatter. That much took home my commendation for him, and I figured he could be trustworthy all the while.

"I'm Junko Enoshima," I exchanged my name for his. "Um, nice to meet you."

"Hell yeah." He agreed with a simple nod of his head. He did not add to his response, so I assumed that would be the end of our small talk. With a small sigh, I silently paced away from Mondo and towards the last cluster of Ultimate students.

The one nearest to me was an extremely tall and muscular brown skinned girl with stringy white hair that fell all the way down to her back. She wore a simple white Japanese school uniform with a navy skirt barely skimming her muscly thighs. Her narrowed eyes were a sharp, icy blue, but seemed approachable enough as I walked forward to introduce myself. Despite appearing to be menacing and brute, her voice was surprisingly cordial and welcoming when she said, "I am Sakura Ogami, the Ultimate Martial Artist."

She definitely lived up to that title of hers. She has competed in over four hundred matches and never lost a single one ever since the first day she began training. Naturally talented, she claimed championship in a countrywide martial arts tournament held in America, despite being a girl. Some online call her the Strongest Female Alive, and seeing her in front of me, right now, I had no reason to doubt what they said. 

"Junko Enoshima, is that right?" She questioned me. I nodded my head with a small hum to confirm. "If you ever want to train, you're always welcome to come to me." I smiled; I had never been considered one to work out, considering my model figure, and I fairly appreciated the offer. I had always had the thought of working out in the back of my mind, and maybe, Sakura would be the one to help me get started.

"Thank you." I left the conversation at that, eager to wrap things up with the introductions. After repeating my name for several times, I realized that I was beginning to tire. I decided to continue on with the tall, blonde haired boy standing near my right.

His blue eyes flashed unfriendliness and disapproval at me behind white framed glasses as he said, "Name's Byakuya Togami."

Cold. That was the overwhelming aura I got from his underbaked introduction. But what did I really expect from the Ultimate Affluent Progeny? 

He was the exact definition of an Ultimate: he was the heir of his family's massive financial conglomerate, the Togami Cooperation. He has already begun managing business operations, and was beginning to take control over the reigns of the Togami family. He was without a doubt, exceptional. Rumor had it that he was already making millions of dollars and running functions when he was merely in middle school. I certainly would not want to get into a disagreement with him.

"We're done with introductions, right? How much longer are you going to stand there?" He snapped with vemon sprouting from his words. "Go away, cover girl."

"O-Okay..." I uttered in disbelief at the immense lack of conversed words. It was no use, trying to start a discussion with him. I was afraid of what insults he'd call me next. Not wanting to remain near him any longer, I moved onto the second to last student of the class.

It was the boy with dark, wild dreadlocks from earlier, the same one who had acknologed my appearance to the rest of the group. He gave me a relaxed grin before saying, "I'm Yasuhiro Hagakure - Hiro for short! Ultimate Clairvoyant, yeah?"

The Ultimate Clairvoyant, also known as "Supernova" amongst the psychic community. I wasn't too big on the entire fortune telling thing, but I figured it didn't hurt to do some research beforehand. He was a trendsetter, for sure. Everywhere I dug into, I saw his name appear, like spontaneous weeds growing from a rainstorm. It was safe to say he was quite popular online.

"But if you want to know more, we should go out and get some brewskis sometime and get to know each other better." He said lightheartedly with a short laugh. My eyes widened immediately at his casual offer to drink alcohol.

"What? We're not allowed to drink!" I quickly rebutted his statement with an exclaimation of my own. "We're in high school, after all."

He gazed at me with a knowing smile. "Oh, I'm actually 21. I've been held back a few times, see, and..." his voice trailed off as he ventured deeper in thought. "Well, it's a long story."

For a full fledged adult to be walking among us freshmen was shocking, and a bit uncomfortable, if I had to be honest. But all the while, Yasuhiro did seem like a nice guy, just a bit older than the rest. I decided I could trust him, at least for now. Who knows what might happen next?

The last student left unintroduced to me was the pale girl with black double drills sprouting from her head. She was dressed rather proper for the first day of school, with a black and white gothic lolita style outfit paired with a white bonnet and dark red mary janes. I could tell that she was going for a medieval European fashion, for her outfit was complex with lace and layers of dark fabric. Even her voice was sophisticated when she spoke.

"I do not think we have been introduced," she began, a heavy German accent accompanying her former words. "I am Celestia Lundenberg, the Ultimate Gambler."

"Celestia..what?" I tried to recall her name, as it was complex and different, compared to all of the Japanese names I had heard from the others. She gave a polite and patient laugh before finishing my confused statement.

"Ludenberg." She repeated. "It is my name. But if you don't mind, I would prefer for you to call me Celeste."

"Um," I pondered, studying her appearence. She took no offense, even when I said, "You are Japanese, right?"

She looked deep into my own eyes, searching my soul thoroughly. "Of course. Why do you ask?"

I wondered whether she was lying or not. After all, the media claims that she is an extraordinary liar - some even call her the Queen of Liars. She used this astounding ability of hers to trick and win her way around the underground world of gambling. She has never been known to lose a bet, and even won a huge, illegal gambling tournament, stealing the other players' life savings and wagers. I could only guess how much money she has won from her skills.

"Um, it's nothing." I quickly responded, dismissing her question. "Never mind."

She sighed with a tight lipped smile on her face. "Well, I look forward to getting to you better." She chuckled again into her hand, a small act of courtesy, before walking away into the crowd. I must be wary around her, I thought. Anything coming from her mouth held the potential of being a lie.

Just as I finished talking to Celeste, a rather demanding, cutthroat voice cut through the thick crowd of students.

"Okay, time to get down to business," Byakuya said, firm voice lacking emotion. "This is no time to stand around and make friends with the rest of you lot."

Although he said it much harsher than I'd prefer, I had to agree with him. "Yeah, someone said something about there being a bigger problem? What was that about?"

"Well, you see," Sayaka piped up from where she was standing. "Today's supposed to be our first day of school, right? So, why are we all gathered like this? Isn't it strange?"

"Everything was normal when I first got here," Makoto added, agreeing with her. "But then I fell asleep, and woke up in an empty classroom."

Sayaka nodded glumly. "That holds true for everyone." She said, almost disappointed in herself.

"What? Seriously?" I exclaimed, turning to face her in discordance. I was hoping that at least someone here would have some knowledge about what was going on, but it turns out, I was too optimistic. I was forced to sucumb to the fact that we were all clueless pawns in a much bigger game set up by somebody unknown.

"Yeah, when we all got to the main hall, we just lost consciousness," Leon ran his fingers to comb down his spiky hair. "Then we came to, we were somewhere in this school? That happened to you too, right?"

"That's right, but..." I tried to think of an explanation behind this entire situation to calm down my racing mind. "But that's just weird, for every one of us to get knocked out like that."

"That's exactly why we're freaking the fuck out!" Mondo yelled, his face reddening with a mixture of confusion and frustration.

Kiyotaka cupped his chin in his palms, furrowing his thick eyebrows. "And that's not the only thing. You saw how all the windows in the classrooms and hallways were covered by metal plates, right? What's that all about?"

"Plus, all my stuff's missing too," Hifumi chimed in. "Even my cellphone!"

"You're right," Chihiro acknowledged the fact. "I haven't seen my PDA anywhere either."

I reached deep into the pockets of my black cardigan, severly wishing that what they said didn't apply to me. But my attempt was in vain, and I wounded up empty handed, devoid of all my belongings. 

"And then there's the main hall there," Kiyotaka grimaced at the large hatch sitting in the hall. "The front exit's completely blocked by some giant metal hatch. But there wasn't anything like that when I first got here! What's it doing here?"

"Maybe we got caught up in some kinda, like..." Makoto began, stumbling over his words as he tried to think of a reason. "You know, crime or something?"

"What, like a kidnapping?" Leon mentioned, nervously laughing away his discomfort. "You think maybe someone grabbed us and hauled us off and we're not actually at school?"

"Hey, come on!" Yasuhiro cut in before Leon could continue any farther. "Don't think like that! I bet this is all just part of the school's orientation procedure."

Chihiro seemed to relax a bit from his statement. "Oh, so you think they wanted to do something to surprise us?"

Leon groaned in response, visbly annoyed with the whole situation. "Huh. Well, if that's what it is, it's nap time for me."

Eased by this temporary explanation, the tension in the main hall suddenly evaporated as the students inside breathed a little easier, including me. Maybe, like what Yasuhiro said, this was just a school orientation program to test the students. After all, we are among the Ultimates, and a little challenge can easily be overcome by the talented. Feeling more at tranquility, I sighed in relief and the knot inside my chest began to undo itself.

Then.

The haunting sound of a school bell rang through the main hall, like an echo refusing to cease. It stung into my brain and splintered my eardrums with its shrill noise, and I could hear some of my classmates yell out in utter shock. Once the commotion had died down a bit, a voice spoke from a monitor hanging overhead.

"Ahem! Ahem! Testing, testing! Mike check, one two!" It was cheerful, almost too excited to be a professional authority. Rather, it seemed to belong to a bear shaped silhouette that displayed itself on the monitor screen, further deepening my confusion and fear. "This is a test of the school broadcast system!"

"What the fuck is that?" came Mondo, his voice spiked with bewilderment and alarm.

"Oh my god, who is that?" exclaimed Sayaka, who was soon accompanied by Kiyotaka repeating her sequence of words.

"Shh, calm down!" Aoi whispered frantically.

"Am I on? Can everybody hear me?" The strange voice smoothly continued on without any acknowledgment of our wide eyed shock. It was so playful, completely out of place compared to ours. "Okay, well then...! 

"Ah, to all incoming students! I would like to begin the enterance ceremony at...right now!

"Please make your way to the gymnasium at your earliest convenience." The voice resumed, a dreadful giddiness lying underneath each word. "That's all. I'll be waiting!"

Then, the monitor screen faded to complete blackness and the audio was cut clean.

"W-What the hell was that just now?" Makoto inquired, visible uncertainty and horror displayed across his face. 

"Well, then, if you'll excuse me..." Byakuya pushed past him, barely recognizing his mystified expression. 

"H-Hey!" He snapped into his senses and called after the blond boy, who I assumed was departing for the gym. "Are you just gonna take off like that?"

He showed no response to his worried claims, and continued to maneuver his way out of the main hall.

"Oh, I get it now! So this was just to pump us up for the enterance ceremony, huh?" Yasuhiro said. He laughed wholeheartedly. "Man, thank god that was a joke! I'd be totally freaked out if it was real."

"Well, what if it _is_ real?" Leon brought up, but was quickly ignored.

"Alright, I guess I'll head out too. Wonder what this whole enterance ceremony is like." He waltzed out of the main hall, as if leaving for a lunch break. I wished to share some his comfort, as my heart was ready to burst from anticipation and dread.

Leon sighed, hanging his head at his ignored statement. "Man, I was really looking forwards to that nap. Why they gotta make us haul our asses over there?" 

As he began to sullenly walk out of the room, Chihiro called out after him, "W-Wait for me! I wanna go with you!"

She chased after him, stumbling a bit here and there, and before long, they were out of sight.

"That is that, then." Celeste curtly bent over to bow. "I will see you all there."

As she elegantly flowed out of the room, Kiyotaka pointed after her. "Well, what are we waiting for? Let's gather at the gymnasium!"

Between mumbles and grumbles of complaints, people began to file out of the main hall, one by one. I desired to follow the crowd, but my feet refused to take any orders from my brain, and I was frozen in place with shock.

A rotten feeling of unease and disgust clawed its way into my mind, and I felt as if my body had been infiltrated by a disease. My heart stopped beating a normal pace, and I couldn't sense any parts of my own body. I felt completely and utterly unprepared for what's to come, and I did not know if I had any trust left in anyone, or anything.

"This...this doesn't seem right." Sayaka admitted, her voice a soft mumble as if she wasn't sure of the words she just spoke.

"Yeah, that announcement was really weird." Makoto added, silently fidgeting with his fingers to occupy his mind.

"Maybe, but just staying put doesn't mean we'll be safe." Kyoko spoke up, her voice more strong and solid than any stone. "Besides, aren't you guys just a bit curious to find out what’s going on here?"

"If we do not move forward, we learn nothing." Sakura agreed with her, arms crossed over her chest as she appeared to be considering her options. "The only choice is to push ahead."

"She's right." I finally found my own voice, after a while in distress. Although my body was tingling to the brim with nerves, and although I wanted to run away as quickly as possible, I swallowed and continue to speak "They said to go to the gym, right? So let's go."

My legs were still shaky as I left the main hall, but I felt some sense of assurance now that I was accompanied by my classmates. The dim hallways were less creepy, somehow, and the air seemed to be warmer on my goosebumped skin. Whatever that bear was, I thought to myself as my sore feet carried me through the corridors of the school. It couldn't do much harm, right? At least, certainly not to all of us, I hope. 

I pulled the door open to the gym foyer and held it for the rest of the lingering classmates. Each muttered a low thanks beneath their breath, and I felt a unknowing chill chase down my spine as I watched most of them immediately file inside the gymnasium.

There were only a few remaining in the foyer when I closed the heavy twin doors behind me. They seemed to be waiting, for what, I did not know. 

"This school is seriously creepy." Makoto shivered, clutching tightly onto his arms. I had to agree: there was something completely off about this academy.

"Where are the other classes?" Sayaka pondered out loud, her voice trembly and overspilling with doubt. "I haven't seen a single person other than us while in the halls."

"We'll have to find the answers ourselves, I presume." Kyoko said flatly. "Come on, let's head inside the gym."

I tried to push down the swirling, thick feeling of anxiety and dread into a small ball inside my stomach, but that only made me want to retch. Weighed down by discontent and worry, I realized I had no choice but to follow what the announcement had instructed us to do. Fueled by raw despair, I reluctantly yanked open the gym doors, bracing myself for the worst.

But what I saw was far more terrifying than anything I could ever imagine.

It appeared to be a normal enterance ceremony, with the stage neatly decorated and every student lined up in neat columns inside the gym. Red banners and confetti were tossed about, fancying up the place. The stage was alight. It all seemed ordinary, I had to admit.

But the one abnormal, disconcerning thing was right on the podium itself.

A monochrome stuffed bear with a wicked grin on one black side, and a neutral face on the other white one, was sitting happily in front of the class.

"Huh? A teddy bear?" I heard Chihiro's voice question, quivering with confusion.

"I'm not a teddy bear!" It yelled, making all the hairs on my arm stand straight up. "I am Monokuma! And I am this school's headmaster!"

I felt my lips move to form words, but I failed to hear what was said. What I was seeing, with my very own two eyes, was utterly incomprehensible. I hoped to wake up, because I refused to believe this was reality, and not a horrifying nightmare. I pinched the soft flesh of my inner wrist over and over, but it was all useless. I was fully and completely awake, and I was quickly filled with pure fear.

"Nice to meet you all!" Monokuma greeted cheerfully, sending arrows of panic surging into my chest. His merry and bright voice was just so out of place, it petrified me more than any growl or whisper could.

"That teddy bear can talk!" Hifumi screamed in terror, almost toppling over from shock.

"I already told you, I'm not a teddy bear!" Monokuma repeated, quite angrily too, as if he was frustrated at us not being able to keep up with such demands. He slammed his paws against the podium, startling the couple of students occupying the front row. "I'm Monokuma! And I'm your headmaster!" 

"Headmaster?" My voice returned to me at last as a hoarse rasp scraping inside my throat. It all had to be some sort of twisted joke: I had too many questions as to how and why this stuffed robot bear was our proclaimed headmaster. If not for my paralyzing panic and doubt, it would all be ridiculous, yet I am still frozen in disbelief at the reality that enveloped myself and my classmates. 

"It moved too?" Hifumi screeched.

"Seriously man, calm down!" Mondo barked at him impatiently. "It's prolly some remote controlled toy or something."

"Don't compare your headmaster to a child's toy!" Monokuma appeared upset, waving his stuffed paws distractedly in the air. "Now, now, ignoring that, let's get this show on the road." He stood straight and stiffened his back before bowing low to the rest of us. "Good morning, students of Hope's Peak!"

Kiyotaka immediately bowed back to the bear with courtesy. "Good morning!"

"D-don’t play along!" Toko, who was standing next to him, hissed between gritted teeth, trying to warn him.

"Anyways, welcome to Hope's Peak Academy!" Monokuma continued, pacing back and forth the podium like how a human would. "Let us commence with a most noteworth and memorable entrance ceremony!"

It was impressive yet terrifying how advanced he moved and talked, for a stuffed bear, at least. My mind still refused to comprehend it all, even when he resumed preaching, like any other headmaster would to their fresh students. 

"Now, ah, make no mistake. You few high schoolers, so full of potential, represent the hope of the world." He started off with much gusto, voice dramatic like a movie voiceover. It set me off the wrong foot, chilling me to my very core, "And to protect such splendid hope, you must live together in harmony inside the confinements of this academy! Everyone will dwell peacefully here, and adhere to the rules and regulations of the school." 

"Huh?" came Leon's voice, full of bewilderment and denial.

"Ah, now then, regrading the cutoff period of this communal life..." Monokuma ignored any lingering questions from us students. "Actually, who am I kidding, there isn't one! You'll all spend the rest of your lives here, until the day you die! Such is the school life you've been assigned."

"W-What did he just say?" Toko gasped, her voice getting lost inside her chest.

"The rest of our lives? Spent here?" Chihiro meekly repeated.

"Stop joking around, you motherfucker!" Mondo demanded, his fingers curling into a tight fist.

"Oh, but fear not!" Monokuma exclaimed over the rising, tense mob of voices in an attempt to speak over them. "We have quite an abundant budget, so don't worry about a lack of common conveniences."

"T-That's the least of our worries now!" Sayaka protested, and I could hear panic begin to sink into her words. "This isn't the problem!"

"Yeah, what the hell? You're saying I have to live here forever?" Makoto objected. "Y-You can't be serious, right?"

"Does that..." My lips stop dead in their tracks as I pieced one puzzle to another, forming a horrifying, ugly picture of the truth. "Does that mean, the iron plates in the classrooms and halls are meant to keep us all here?"

"Ding, ding! Right on the money, miss!" Monokuma enthused, beginning to move and dance on the stage. "You're completely cut off from that dirty, dirty, outside world. So you can scream and yell as much as you want, and still, no one will rescue you!"

"What the hell is this?" Leon blurt out. "This has to be a joke, right? There's no way we have to live here forever."

"But if it is not indeed a sick prank," Celeste spoke up, her voice still steady and polite as ever. "It would be most unfortunate to spend the rest of our lives here."

"What's up with you kids? So ungrateful for all I've provided," Monokuma seemed rather dejected as he muttered, shaking his head and drooping his back to look at the ground. "Well, if you're oh-so eager to leave this school, I did establish a certain rule that will guarantee freedom."

"R-Really?" stammered Toko as she began to back away from the frightful stage. I did as well, even though I was further in the back of the crowd: I did not want to linger any closer to Monokuma than I needed to, for who knows what would happen if I did.

"A rule?" Byakuya repeated, his narrowed eyes shooting up to glare at the bear standing on the podium.

"I call it the Graduation Clause!" explained Monokuma, pacing eagerly around the stage, as if performing. I tried to swallow the lump forming in my throat and found difficulty in doing so. I had a nagging, dreadful feeling about this Graduation Clause. There was no way in hell he would let us go with such ease; whatever this rule was, it would be risky, deathly, costly. 

"If one student were to disrupt the harmony of this communal life you have established tohgether, then that person is allowed to leave." 

"Disrupt? What does that mean?" Byakuya inquired, tone flat and demanding.

"Oh, you know, if one student were to murder another."

The blood that ran through my veins froze into solid ice until my vessels bursted with complete and utter disbelief.

"M-Murder?" I weakly repeated, almost falling backwards in my dizzying trance. I wished that he was merely joking around, or at the very least, that my ears had failed me, but the surprised shouts of dismay that engulfed the room informed me that everything happening was as real as can be.

"Why must we kill each other?" Sayaka's voice was rigid with outrighteous horror as she shouted empty words.

"What the hell are you talking about?" demanded Leon. "To kill each other is..." His voice trailed off, as if he could not express his baffling concern in words. 

Monokuma simply tipped his head to the side, like he was trying to read our opaque distress. "To kill each other is to kill each other. Do you need a dictionary?" 

"We know what it means, that's not the problem!" Aoi shouted with spite. She sounded upset, hurt, almost, but above all, terrified. "Why do we have to kill each other?"

I was suddenly playing a game of tag with my consiousness. I could feel it drifting further from my grasp, refusing to keep up with reality, and desiring to be put to rest. My vision began to blur, and I could no longer see clearly through my eyes. My heart pounded like a hammer inside my chest, and my breathing soon followed. With eyelids firmly shut, I deeply prayed and prayed that this was all just a nightmare.

And it was, actually. It was merely a physical one rather than mental, and I was just living in it. 

"Y-Yeah! Stop with this nonsense and take us home!" Hifumi yelled, but his voice was full of uncertainty and it trembled with unease. He, I, us all, were concealed in a horrifying nightmare that cornered us like hungry predators. 

"Nonsense?" Monokuma echoed. A set of sharp, silver claws unsheathed themselves from his black left paw as he snarled, "Listen. From this moment on, this school is your home, your life, your world. Got it? I'm gonna let you kill, kill, and kill some more!"

"You little bitch," Mondo's growl was like the rumble of thunder, a low, threatening warning of the catastrophe that would follow after. He shoved his way past the thick, trembling clump of students - not that he needed to, for everyone parted the way for him - to face Monokuma head on, staring dead into his eyes. "Listen up, asshole! This shit's gone way too far! What the hell kinda joke _is_ this?"

Monokuma did not even flinch from the barbed aura of pure hate that surrounded Mondo. In fact, he tilted his head playfully at his rage and said, "Joke? What, you mean like your hair?"

I could see the veins on Mondo's forehead tighten like a cord as he vigorously snatched Monokuma with one hand. 

"Gotcha, you little piece of shit!" He hissed between his teeth, flaming hot anger pouring from his words like steam. "I dunno if you're a toy or a stuffed animal or whatever the hell! Either way, I'm gonna rip you to fuckin' shreds!"

Appearing quite panicked, Monokuma fruitlessly flailed inside Mondo's grip. "Waah! Violence against the headmaster is in violation of school regulations!"

"Whatever the fuck that means!" Mondo snarled, ignoring his desperate words of warning. "Let me outta here, or I swear to Christ..."

All too suddenly, Monokuma grew limp at once, his chin drooping to meet his furry chest, and his left eye flashed a hazardous ruby red. Some sort of beeping sound began to emanate from his body, loud and shrill, like a siren. Perhaps it was a siren, because the piercing tempo grew louder and faster with each ticking second. My stomach twisted itself into a dozen knots.

"What's that sound?" growled Mondo, narrowing his eyes at Monokuma and shaking his slack figure in intense fury. "Say something, would ya?"

I saw Kyoko's body snap forward in wide eyed alarm. "Watch out! Get rid of it!"

Mondo snapped his head to glare at her, a mix of ignorance and irritability clouding his pupils. "Huh?"

"Just listen to me! Throw it!" She yelled, her tone rising to matching the growing intensity of the siren. Her words must've sent a bitter shock of realization through him as they did me, because instantaneously, he threw his arm back and strenuously hurled Monokuma into the air.

The beeping ran at such an accelerated pace, it completely fell silent to my ears when Monokuma spontaneously exploded in midair.

I'm pretty sure I heard a few dozen screams exchange through the air as smoke began to swallow the room. The gymnasium rapidly started to fill with the intense stench of gunpowder, and my ears painfully echoed with a stingy, ringing noise. I had only seen such occurances in movies or fiction novels, but it meekly compared to the reality. The rush of raw, animalistic panic, and instinctive terror stabbed through me with ease, and it was nothing like I'd ever felt before in my life. It was like a fight or flight reaction kicked in, because I felt the urge to scream and escape as fast as I could.

As the excruciating ringing inside my ears died down to the defeaning pound of my own erratic heartbeat, a series of gasps escaped from my dry throat. He just _exploded_. I could not believe my eyes.

"W-What the hell?" Mondo exclaimed, leaping back at once, his eyes wide with horror. "It just blew up!"

Chihiro cautiously leaned forward. "Wait, does that mean the teddy bear's dead?" 

I wanted to breathe a sigh of relief at such news, sit down and admire the stress that has been removed, but I knew I was just being too hopeful.

Because in a place like this, was there really any hope to grasp onto?

"I told you, I'm not a teddy bear! I'm Monokuma!" came his taunting voice. And before I could even comprehend a single thing, Monokuma sprung from behind the podium, and regained his position on stage. He looked and acted as if nothing had never even happened, as if he didn't explode and almost murder the rest of us. 

"Eh? There's another one?" Leon cried out the exact words I had in mind as well.

"You son of a bitch! You seriously tried to kill me just now!" Mondo snapped, clutching his fingers into a fist. I had the overwhelming gut feeling that he was preparing to confront Monokuma once again.

"Well, yes. I was serious about trying to kill you." His tiny, razor claws glinted silver beneath the glow of the overhead lights, like knives before a bloody slaughter. "You did violate one of the school regulations, after all. But I'll let you off with a warning this time. If I catch somebody else breaking the school rules," his jagged left eye radiated a thirsty crimson as he brought his talons to his face. "I'll activate my great corporal punishment function like I did just now."

"Wait, hold on," blurted Makoto. "Does this mean there's like, a bunch more of you somewhere?"

Monokuma rocked back and forth on the balls of feet. "Correctomundo! Monokumas, along with surveillance cameras, have been placed all throughout the school. That way, if anyone is caught breaking another rule, they won't hesitate to be punished!"

"Punishment? You call that punishment?" Aoi stammered from immense fright, slowly inching herself away from the bear. "That's just wrong!"

Waving his paws in the air like he was chasing away fruit flies, Monokuma said, "Whatever, whatever. Let's move on already from rule breaking, that totally busts my spirit." He dragged the word "totally" until he pulled out a stack of small electric gadgets. From where, I could only imagine. At this rate, everything coming at me was so fast, so unthinkable, that I barely even cared about how he managed to summon these items at will.

"Let's do something more cheery, yeah? This is our official student e-handbook!" He hopped off of the stage with expertise and began to weave through the thick lump of shivering students. Handing one to the nearest student, Makoto, he added, "Pretty cool, huh?"

Monokuma began to pass the digital handbooks out one by one to each student, explaining all the magnificent qualities as he went along his merry way. "When you start it up, it will display your name." When he got around to me, he slid a thin, flat tablet-like electronical device into my awaiting outstretched hands. "Always make sure you have the right one!"

I cautiously turned my own, worried that this was another one of Monokuma's sick punishments. Fortunately for me, no bombs or poisonous smog came bursting out from the e-handbook; instead, there was my name, my full name, and the time displayed in the top corner, informing me that it was still morning. It did not, however, tell me the current date. My head spun with all the endless possibilities my mind made up for the unknown.

There was also a small, pixilated icon of a map pictured on the screen. Tapping on it to confirm it myself, I saw that there was, indeed, a digital map of the entire school. I saw a dining hall, a bathhouse, dorm rooms, and countless entangled hallways. Although, it lacked features including the upper floors, and I presumed that the second, third, and fourth floors were off limits as of now.

"Shock proof, fire proof, water proof, everything proof!" Monokuma claimed with etcasy and a hint of pride in his assumed creations. "You could even smash this thing in with a wrecking ball, and it'll _still_ turn on! Technology, it's impressive isn't it?"

Murmurs and whispers marked the discoveries of the handbook's attributes made by each classmate, their voices eating up the gymnasium. I too found myself joining in to the chorus of amused yet puzzled mumbles as I further uncovered every characteristic my handbook held.

"These e-handbooks are essential to your school communal life, so keep yours close!" Monokuma attempted to reclimb the stage, his body half dangling from the edges of the platform. Wiggling his way up, he heartily jumped to his feet and found his path back on top of the red podium. "It contains all of our school regulations, so make sure you review them thoroughly!"

Sure enough, I unearthed, there were the school regulations, printed neatly in digital lettering. They were all numbered accordingly, and I scrolled through a few with a swipe of my index finger. Some were expected, such as no littering inside the school campus, or strictly sleeping inside the student dorms. But others sent a shiver racing down my spine: if a student murders another, they become the blackened; the blackened, if not discovered, is considered to have graduated, and may leave the school. Closing my device at once, I cleared any hints jabbing at the potential of a murder away from my eyes. I did not want to be reminded of such unimaginable, unsettling realities.

"You'll hear me say this a lot, but _any_ violation of school rules will not be tolerated." Monokuma repeated. His voice was even sharper than his menacing claws, and I could tell he was dead serious about that. "Rules are meant to protect the harmony of this school's peace, so it is crucial that any naughty rule breakers will get punished."

"Punished, my ass." I heard Mondo mutter severely under his breath. It was clear he was still traumatized from the warning Monokuma forced us into from earlier.

"Okay, well, that's just about all there is too it!" The bear exclaimed eagerly, ignoring any and all questions we still had left unanswered. "That brings our enterance ceremony to a close. Please enjoy your abundantly dreary school life!"

Without any lingering words of wisdom, he disappeared right in front of my own eyes, sinking slowly into the podium to a undiscovered world that we were all unaware of.

No one said a word.

We were all still from shock, not daring to budge, as we were afraid something were to happen as a consequence. We looked at each other, eyes wide and darting, unbelieving of what just occured. I could hear my breath rise rapidly and noisily inside my chest, like a starving animal begging for freedom. My palms were beginning to slick with sweat, and I rubbed the damp skin harshly against the soft fabric of my red miniskirt in an attempt to dry them off. And I was not the only one in distress: several of my fellow classmates appeared uncomfortable, scared, confused. 

"So guys, does anyone have a good summarization of what we just experienced?" Kiyotaka began awkwardly, his voice weighed by hefty concern and trepidation. 

"How...? Why...?" Leon's sentenced ended as soon as they started, unable to express his intense bewilderment. "I don't understand any of this..."

"We have to live here f-forever? Or k-kill?" stuttered Toko as she clutched her head in her hands, trembling from the mass wave of emotion that crashed into her. "Wh-What just happened?"

"Everyone, we need to just calm down," Kyoko spoke up. She seemed to be the only unflustered and rational out of all of us. "We need to go over everything that was said. According to Monokuma, we essentially have two choices. Choice number one is that we each stay here, living a "communal life" together until the day we die."

"B-But-" Makoto was instantly cut off by Kyoko regaining her train of thought.

"The other choice is to kill another in order to escape the school." She finished. Celeste nodded to show her acknowledgment.

"It seems those are our only options as of now." She agreed. "This is a kill or be killed world."

"But killing someone..." Chihiro's eyes began to water and shake with pent up tension. "That's...that's..."

"You're saying we were abduted out of nowhere and stuffed into this place resembling a school, and now we're supposed to start killing each other?" Hifumi quickly began to spiral into deep panic, visible traces of sweat running down his forehead. "What IS this?"

"A lie, is what it is." said Kiyotaka, his face darkening with dejection. His tone grew firmer and firmer as he continued on, as if he were hoping he could speak it into existence. "All these ridiculous things we've heard. This all has to be fake!"

"Right now, it doesn't really matter if it's real or fake." Byakuya's face was a sheet of ice: cold, hard, unreadable. "What matters is whether or not someone here takes what Monokuma said into consideration."

The room fell into a deafening silence as nobody bothered to offer a response. I spared a glance to the other students, hoping someone had something to say, but I was rewarded with nothing but dead stillness. Instead, we all chose to exchange stares with one another, attempting to read the minds of our peers. On each face was etched the look of fright. In each pairs of eyes were the gaping voids of anticipation. On each tongue laid the sour doubt reserved for others. The tension inside the room peaked so high, it was unthinkable how sunken our morales were.

Those words he said to us, "You must kill someone in order to leave", planted hostile, inhuman thoughts deep inside our minds, making us doubt whether we really were capable of being moral or not. I felt myself drowning in such thick hopelessness, I could no longer hear my own thoughts over the roaring rush of pure misery. I still refused to believe anyone would fall into such despondency, but perhaps I was being too expectant yet again. Judging from the way we shot brooding, threatening glares at each other, it soon became clear that we were suspicious of everyone else. Betrayal hung low over our heads, like fruit teasing, tempting us to reach, and I was forced to wonder if I could really trust anybody now.

I gritted my teeth, wordlessly cursing my whole life.

Hope's Peak Academy.

It was not a school of hope.

It was a school of despair.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is an overdone idea but i love evil makoto so


	2. Chapter One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How To Survive 101

Silence had never felt so suffocating.

It wrapped itself around my neck and choked my windpipe, like a tight noose being caught around my throat, straining each and every drop of life out of me. My chest felt empty, like my heart had been forcefully pried from my torso with a razor edged knife. I sensed that my face was beginning to heat up, and I realized with boiling horror that this was reality. No matter how many times I tried to awaken, I could not escape this dizzying nightmare. A paralyzing fear slowly dominated my body, and I could no longer move out of my free will. 

Exceedingly contrasting my state of frozen terror, Kyoko's pointed words cut through the thick, hefty weight of the tensing, silent atmosphere. "So? What are we going to do now? Just stand around glaring at each other?"

I felt her voice instantly pierce through me like a sword, and I was forced back into my senses. Her taunting yet firm comment seemed to do the same favor for everyone else, and I could feel ourselves finally regaining control over our stiff, lead heavy bodies.

"R-Right...She's right!" said Kiyotaka, launching straight back into his bold awareness. "Sometimes, even if you're nervous or afraid, you just have to step forward!"

"Perhaps, but," Hifumi agreed with reluctance, appearing deep in strained thought. "What do we step forward to anyway? What is our mission?"

"Well, obviously look for a way out, duh!" Leon replied obnoxiously, jeeringly, almost. I could sense his fiery impatience as he continued, "We all wanna go home, right?"

"That, and we need to find whoever was controlling that bear, Monokuma," Makoto went on to say. He seemed to be having some difficulty voicing his opinions. "You know, like a mastermind or something."

"A mastermind orchestrating this whole event for us," Celeste echoed her own inner thoughts out loud for the rest of us to hear. "I wonder, is it one person, or many?'

"Whoever the mastermind is, they must be powerful enough to take over this entire school." offered Chihiro, a cloud of consideration and intimidation spreading across her face. "And these handbooks, too. They're highly advanced, and they must be costly to create. We should take a look first."

"It's probably best to check out the school regulations Monokuma mentioned before doing anything else so recklessly," Kyoko concurred, slowly nodding her head. Her eyes were narrowed in deep wonder and perplexity, as if she were searching her own mind for answers. "If we stumble around with no clue what the rules are, something like that might happen again."

"Well, let's hurry up and check out the goddamn rules already." Mondo snarled, forcibly turning his e-handbook on.

I mirrored his steps and gazed back at my own handbook. Just as before, my full name popped up on screen, greeting my eyes. Selecting the school regulations icon from the main menu that followed soon after, I began to rebrowse thoroughly through the rules.

The regulations were numbered in order as I flipped through them one by one. The first one that appeared on the digital surface had the number "1" floating overhead, accompanied by a crest bearing a set of angel wings and a king's crown. Beneath, spelled out in pristine, white letters, was rule number one: "Students may reside only within the school. Leaving campus is an unacceptable use of time."

When I clicked to the next screen, I saw a display almost identical to the previous one, only the number transformed into a "2", and the sentence below was different. My eyes skimmed over the words, set on hammering these rules deep into my brain: "'Nighttime" is from 10 p.m to 7 a.m. Some areas are off-limits at night, so please exercise caution."

Each rule shared similar interfaces, only with fluctuating regulations. For instance, rule three read, "Sleeping anywhere other than the dormitory will be seen as sleeping in class and punished accordingly." I recalled seeing that one earlier as I briefly flipped through the rules earlier on during the entrance ceremony, and it frightened me to think someone would get severely injured, if not killed, for simply falling asleep outside of the dorms.

The remaining regulations, thankfully, seemed reasonable enough. The next rule granted us permission to explore Hope's Peak Academy at our discretion, and the one following consecutively forbid us from destroying surveillance cameras and assaulting Monokuma. The sixth principle distressfully reminded me of the true horrors within the walls of this school: "Anyone who kills a fellow student and becomes "blackened" will graduate, unless they are discovered."

"Unless they are discovered?" I heard myself murmur the exact words I read on screen. "What does that mean?"

With a short sigh of testiness, Byakuya cogently explained, "It's saying that if you want to graduate, you have to kill someone without anyone finding out it was you."

Toko, at once, held her trembling hands close to her chest, afraid that someone would attack her. "B-But why do we h-have to do that?"

Byakuya's arms laid crossed on top of his chest, as if he were irritated at her lack of ability to keep up. "I don't see any reason to worry about it." His eyes narrowed at a sharp, judgmental angle as he snapped the words right back at her. It was clear that he was annoyed by her mere presence. "Just worry about following the rules as they've been explained to us."

Before she could even have a moment to respond, he added one, final, bitter retort. "Frankly, I don't want to hear anything from someone who waits for others to decided what to do for them. Make your own decisions, or perhaps you are incapable of doing that as well?"

"D-Don't jab at me..." Toko muttered in reply. Her words were hoarse and hurt, but her face visibly disagreed. She had a small smile stretched across her face, almost like a smirk, and a sweep of rose across her cheeks. She was staring intensely back at Byakuya, who refused to acknowledge her existence, like she was deep in severe admiration for him. It was strange, to say the very least, and I fought the urge to cringe.

Leon, however, was rather oblivious to her odd, peverted reaction, and shook his head from side to side before saying, "More like a full-on stab..."

Aoi stepped up from where she was standing to channel her voice. "Well, for now, forget all that silly junk about murderers or whatever." Her sentences were like choppy, rushing water, unsure of its own route. She cleared her throat and spoke again in a clearer, more optimistic tone. "Now that we know the rules, let's start exploring the school!"

"True." Kiyotaka replied, gradually nodding his head to express his approval. "We need to find out where exactly we are. Is there any way out? What about food and supplies? Those are the questions we need to answer!"

"Let's do it!" exclaimed Leon, raising his tone to match the high level of enthusiasm Kiyotaka carried. "Okay, then let's all start looking around!"

As the morale of the room progressively lifted, bit by bit, student by student, Byakuya simply scoffed with a cross, arrogant look spread across his face. He gazed at the rest of us through penetrative eyes, visibly expressing his disapproval and disgust. "I'll be going alone." He scowled, glaring as if we were all pesky, disturbing insects scattered on the ground. 

"What? Why?" asked Makoto, skepticism dripping rapidly from his questions. He watched through narrowed, distrusting eyes as he began to walk from his spot. "It's better to stick together, don't you think?"

Byakuya gave a scornful stare in return, appearing to consider whether he should laugh out of pure pity or not. "You don't get it, do you? Someone here might already have begun thinking about murdering one of us." He shoved past Makoto, mindlessly shouldering him out of the way in sheer egotism. "Are you saying we should stand around with them in our midst and make it that much easier for them?"

"W-Wait, hold on a second!" Sayaka called out. I could sense her solid dubiety and raw unease, as if they were easily my own. "That would never-"

"What, never happen?" Byakuya snarled, staring dead into her eyes. If looks could kill, she would've died a thousand deaths. It was so intense, so sinister, so bloodless, that even I couldn't help but shrink into my own soul. He certainly made me want to doubt everyone here, and that thought immediately chilled me as soon as it comprehended through my mind. "You can't deny the possibility."

"But still, I-" My own exclamation instantly died within my throat as he shot a threatening look at me, and I cut myself off at once. I realized I was not going to face someone as unsympathetic as him, for he intimidated me to no end. As much as I wanted to disagree with his thinking, I could not muster enough bravery to argue with him, and instead, I remained in a bashful, self depreciating silence, ashamed at my lack of courage.

"That's why you all shrank back in fear when you heard the graduation rule." He continued on with his inconsiderate preaching. A smug, immodest smirk tugged at the corners of his lips, like he was proud of himself for striking such a nerve. "Am I wrong?"

I wanted to find words to fight back against that haughty, insensitive comment, but all my attempts were merely fruitless. The entire class discovered no responses of their own, thus leaving the room stranded in uncomfortable, thick stillness yet again. Byakuya mockingly sneered at the lack of response we had to his previous statement.

"So, I'm simply acting in accordance with what I think is best for me." He finally finished his spiteful speech. Forcing his way past the crowd, he added, "Now, if you don't mind me-"

"Yeah, like hell we're letting you run off and do whatever you want!" Mondo's fury quickly returned without much vacation from his previous fit, and he broke out into a sprint to catch up with him. He halted himself right in front of Byakuya, preventing him from going any further. "You're not going to get away with being that selfish!"

I could feel every hair on my body stand to rise in trepidation, and my heart ran marathon after marathon inside my trembling ribcage. Even though I was far from the climaxing conflict, I still tensed up in preparation to flee as soon as possible. The urge of integrity dwelling deep inside my chest demanded I go stop them from breaking out into a throttle, but I couldn't seem to follow the orders on command. My breath was only a mere rasp inside my heaving, quivering lungs as I watched the two begin to confront one another.

Byakuya showed not a single sign of concern or fear as Mondo threateningly towered over him, eye twitching with absolute hate. In fact, he scoffed at his menacing stance and spat the words, "Out of my way, plankton."

He sure had some impressive nerve, I thought with dread weighting my mind. The last time someone taunted Mondo so derisively, they ended up in bits after a brain scattering explosion. I was certain that everybody had learned their lesson after Monokuma's traumatizing example, but it seemed to go in one ear and out the other for Byakuya Togami. It was idiotic, I had to admit, to purposely set someone off like that to see a response stir within them. I could only imagine what Mondo thought of at that moment, as he began to crack his knuckles, pupils crimson with impure rage.

"What the fuck did you just say?" A animalistic growl arose low from his throat as he raised his fist, shaking with overwhelming wrath. Again, Byakuya remained as calm as ever as he glared right into Mondo's choleric eyes, seething with boiling hot anger. 

"One tiny bit of plankton, drifting across the sea." He elaborated on his deliberate insult, his voice hollow and tormenting. "So minuscule, so insignificant, so pathetic."

That was enough to completely toss Mondo over the edge; he brutally snatched the collar of Byakuya's shirt with one fist and yanked him closer to his flaming face, alight with utter hostility. "You askin' for a death wish?" He yelled in a tone not quite human. "I'll beat your ass!"

It was enough to send me into action as well as I found myself back into my common senses. Quarrels would only separate us further into division, and in an unfamiliar, murderous situation like this, we couldn't afford to give any preexisting bonds up. It thoroughly upset and troubled me to see such discord within our own group of presumed friends. 

"Hey, stop it!" I said, making my way to stand between the two before it could get any uglier. I was aware that by doing so, I potentially signed a death warrant, but at least it was out of my own free will. "What's fighting among ourselves going to achieve?" 

Mondo let his grip on Byakuya fall slack as his attention spontaneously zoomed in on me. His immense height loomed over me entirely, possibly gaining a good eight inches on my own, and hissed furiously in my face, "The fuck you just say? You some kinda goody-goody little bitch?"

With a sweat, I began to regret my decision instantaneously. I did not dare to continue lecturing him when intimidation quickly began to seep into my trembling bones. My heart skipped at an abnormal, erratic pace, and it felt as if my entire torso was about to explode any second from anticipation and fear. "N-No, I wasn't-"

"You think you can tell what I can and can't do?" Ignoring my desperate pleas of mercy, he continued to bark at me with a now raised fist.

"What in the world are you doing?" Aoi seemed to have been fully recovered from her state of shock and was now on high alert. She shoved her way towards the three of us, shouting at the top of her lungs, "Are you seriously gonna hit a girl?"

The cloud of rage and brutality that once draped over Mondo's eyes now evaporated into thin air as his mind faltered between choices. I heard his voice die inside his throat, possibly carrying some sort of explanation along with it, and he backed away from my body. The realization of what he'd almost done suddenly dawned on him, and his muscles loosened at once. He now wore a mask of shame as he glared stubbornly to the ground.

"Whatever, I was just pissed off." He grumbled under his breath, shoving his hands into the pockets of his long, black biker jacket. Aoi did not take his response well.

"Pissed off? At least show some decency!" She yelled in my defense, and I was rather glad that she did. Who knows what could've happened if no one interfered, like how I did before.

With a grunt, he rolled his eyes at her infuriated statements and glared at me once more. "Hey. Um, sorry, I guess." He sounded like he had difficulty in apologizing to me, which I would not blame him for. He was still recuperating from his previous fit of anger, making it fairly complicated to ask forgiveness properly. Though informal, I accepted it nonetheless. 

"It's fine." I replied with an awkward smile in return, hoping it did some reassurance to him. It appeared to have worked some bit, for he nodded, quite stiffly, for sure, and backed off for good.

"Are you okay, Junko?" Aoi questioned my well being with a much softer tone this time. I chuckled politely and waved her off in dismissal of her concern.

"Don't worry about me, I'm alright." I answered, uncomfortable from the crushing weight of everyone's attention heaving down my shoulders. Byakuya, who had now seemed to have retreated from his confrontation, merely gave a short, haughty laugh. It was full of conceited poison, like he had been informed correct of a test question no one else understood.

"See what I mean?" He spat, venom splattering from his edged, jarring taunts. "This is exactly why we can't trust each other." 

Without any further explanation on his unknown hostility, he pushed his way out of the heavy twin doors of the gymnasium, pettily allowing them to slam cacophonously behind him. Everybody watched behind wide, faltering eyes as he flawlessly left the gym, alone, with no one bothering to stop him. It seemed he got exactly what he had wanted from the beginning.

"I-I better chase after him." Toko volunteered beneath incoherent mumbles, stumbling and tripping on her way after Byakuya with nobody's approval. I got the feeling that she had more in mind than just lecturing him.

After the gymnasium doors flung shut for the second time today, no one dared to speak. Instead, we traded unnerving, doubtful looks, gazing around the room for some excuse to stall time. My eyes greeted the floor. It was orange caramel hued, effectively reflective, undoubtedly clean. If I rolled my weight to the tip of my toes, I could see a distorted vision of myself in the shiny surface of the glazed wooden boards. My eyes were abnormally small, my face misshapen, and my chest deformed. Perhaps this was me in just another dimension, one where if gazed into a glossy reflection, my current form would appear instead.

"Well? Are you just going to let him search alone?" Kyoko was always the first to break the unbreakable silence. Her words spoke of valor and indubitable strength, as if she was born to raise us into leadership. "We can't waste any more time. Let's begin looking around the school."

"She-she's right!" exclaimed Sayaka. Her eyebrows were furrowed in bright determination, so luminous, it shone almost as bright as the stages she danced upon. "Come on, let's split up and search this place!"

"I'm pretty sure being alone in this place isn't a good idea..." Leon mumbled underneath his breath, puffing out his cheeks in exasperation.

"Well, then partner up with a person or two!" She fought back with crossing blades. "It'll be much more efficient if we all split up into individual searches than going around in a big group."

"I agree!" declared Kiyotaka, clenching his fist in determination. "Let's meet up in the dining hall after an hour or two, and report what we've found then!"

Yasuhiro let out a long sigh, almost as if he was dreading this. "I can't believe this is happening..." He grumbled, giving his long dreadlocks a shake. 

As he stood still there, arms firmly crossed on top of his chest in a refusal to consider, the rest of the class began to find partners of their own.

"Hey, Mondo!" called Leon with a knowledgeable grin and a wave of his arm. "You're coming with me!"

"Sakura, can you accompany me?" requested Aoi, bouncing on the balls of her feet to gaze up at the taller girl.

"Let's go, Makoto!" said Sayaka, dragging him away in a fit of red faced protest.

One after the other, people paired up and began to walk away from the gym, eager to start their search of the place. I slipped my handbook inside the pocket of my cardigan and gazed around the vast room in desperate search of a partner. I desired to ask Aoi, or Chihiro, or perhaps even Makoto, but they were all quickly snatched up by other students, as if they were hot items for sale. With a defeated sigh of disappointment, I hung and shook my head, muttering self depreciating comments of my own. 

"Do you want to be partners?"

My body shot back on instinct out of pure surprise, startled at the unexpected voice targeted towards me. But when my eyes snapped up to meet the owner of the voice, I became even more alarmed, as it was even more unpredictable than the voice itself.

Kyoko stared patiently back at me, wordlessly waiting for a response from me. Her irises were deep lavender pools of calm, like a lake's stilling waters after an intense rainstorm. She stood still with the tolerance of a weathered, respected, and frankly quite scary teacher, arms hanging on either side of her hips.

I forced myself to return from my loathing to muster some sort of answer to her request. "Oh, um, sure."

It was a lame reply, I'll admit, but whether or not Kyoko agreed with me, she did not show any signs of distaste. Rather, she nodded, as if expecting my response, and turned her shoulder on me. 

"Follow me. I think I might have a good place to begin." Was all she said before ultimately striding out of the room. After I recovered from my foolish state of shock, I started to run after her at once, afraid to lose my one and only partner for the day. 

She got somewhat of a head start on me, because when I finally matched my pace up with hers, we were already pacing inside one of the long, gloomy corridors of Hope's Peak Academy. By now, everyone had left the gymnasium, and I could only hear the faintest echoes of their voices in the halls. Other than the occasional, faraway shout, the only sounds accompanying us were the hollow, ghostly sounds of our boots meeting the tile floor. I let a silent shiver escape from my lips as I rubbed my bare arms up and down to generate some heat. "So, um, where exactly are you going?" 

Without stopping to look back at my frightened and confused expression, she explained, "There was a room I saw earlier that interested me. There was caution tape boarded all over the door, and I couldn't stop thinking about how important it must be to be so protected like that."

The air engulfing my body suddenly turned more rigid as soon as the words left her mouth. "Caution tape..." I mumbled, an unnatural chill tracing up my unyielding spine. "Sounds creepy."

If she heard my useless comment, she did not mention it. She only kept walking forward, her back straight and relaxed, as if she were perfectly comfortable with her surroundings. I, unfortunately, could not relate, for I hunched over and chattered from the icy trepidation that swallowed my confidence whole. I followed her lead as she brought me through the long, entangled hallways.

During our journey to the mysteriously haunting room Kyoko mentioned, we passed by a band of iron plates, all fastened tightly against any chance of window panes underneath. Rust beginning to form on the bolts suggested that they had been there for quite some while now.

But as soon as that possibility passed through my train of thought, I dismissed it. I had only come to Hope's Peak Academy for a day, maybe even less than that. There was absolutely no way that these plates remained where they were for any more than a week, as the school appeared perfectly normal when I first got here. Perhaps my mind was just tricking itself into paranoia, I thought with a chill.

"Do you think we can take off these metal plates?" I offered, my voice trembling for some reason unknown to me. Kyoko halted in her steps to face me with a doubtful, challenging look across her face. She crossed her arms and narrowed her eyes at the large gadgets that licked the halls, suspicious.

"How about you give it a try?" She did not answer my question directly, but instead challenged me to find the answer myself. My arms dropped to my sides as I gave the thought some consideration, before strolling up to the plate nearest to me.

It hung off the left side of the corridor, big and bulky and hefty. It was a dark, rusty brown color, the same tint as raw iron. Judging from the appearance of it, it seemed almost impossible to even get the screws to budge, but it didn't hurt to give it at least one try.

So I bent over slight, not enough to make an intact 90 degree angle with my body, but enough to gingerly hook my fingers underneath the bottom edge of the metal plate. The surface was rough and flaky, just like metal that weathered and peeled off from time. The pungent, overwhelming smell of iron emanated from the device, almost choking my nostrils with the odor. Heaving a large, leaden breath from the bottom of my lungs, I tensed up my shoulders and pulled.

I tugged at the plate with every drop of the strength I had inside my body, until I could feel my breath running short and my face straining from the immense pressure. I did not give up my futile attempts until my vision began to blur, either from tears of exhaustion or creeping unconsciousness, and I let go of the metal plate at last.

When I did, I stumbled back on my heels from the extensive, lingering force, and almost fell on my back, my heart hammering inside my chest from the vast effort I made. Blood pounded inside my ringing ears, and my ribcage rose and fell rapidly from my gasping pants.

It did not move an inch.

"Well," Kyoko must've been some kind of supernatural, for she did not even crack an amused smile at my desperation scrawled on the floor. "It seems that as of currently, these metal plates are impossible to remove."

"You could say that again." I managed to squeeze out before my lungs collapsed again.

"Perhaps we could find some sort of tool to aid us," she continued, perking my interest once again. "I'm almost certain we can find some in that one room. Follow me."

She did not wait for me to recover before resuming to walk, and I was forced to scramble to my knees in order to stabilize myself and chase after her. The soft flesh of my palms were scorched with a raw pain that seeped into every inch of my fingers. The ache spreading beneath my skin was aflame and throbbing, like my nerves were set on fire by some wicked entity. I blew on my hands to cool down the seething pain, but it took a while for it to completely simmer down. My skin was covered in growing blisters and cuts, and the metal plate had left some kind of brown, sticky, powdery substance on my fingers. When I attempted to rub it off on my thigh, it reeked of rotting iron and copper. 

All the while, I was following Kyoko's directions as she drove me from hallway to hallway, turn to turn. I hadn't a clue about where we were heading, but I assumed I could trust her enough to lead the way. However, it was taking quite a while, and I was beginning to question asking her or not whether we were lost or not inside this maze of a school, when she finally came to a stop in the middle of one particular corridor. 

"Here." She said, pointing to a wide door holed inside the right wall of the hall. It was an arch shape, colored a rusty orange with a hint of red, with symmetrical windows and twin black handles. It did not look like something that could be found inside of a high school building, and it certainly was not any classroom of sorts. When I gazed up above the door, I could see a sign hanging above the room. Squinting my eyes, I read the words, "Store". 

"I spotted this on the way to the main hall earlier this morning," Kyoko elaborated, glancing up to read the sign for herself. "But it was completely boarded up with caution tape, so I assumed this place was off limits. I guess not anymore."

"Should we go inside?" I asked rather dumbly.

"I don't see why not." Kyoko replied steadily. Her eyes, instead of excitement, like any other student, held interest and temptation. "Besides, there could be something useful in there."

I agreed with her: this was the first set of resources given to us, and there could be a potential item that could be our way out of the school. It would undoubtedly be reasonable and worthy to check out the school store.

Kyoko grabbed a hold of the two, inky metal handles and yanked the door open. Without much force, the room cleared, and the doors swung out to smash the sides of the walls. I jumped back the slightest bit, surprised by the unexpectedly loud entrance.

Kyoko, on the other hand, did not seem bothered one bit by the vigorous opening, and strolled inside the store with little to none difficulty. I quickly trailed in right after, rather eager to see what items the school had to offer. 

The only word I needed to describe the room was clutter. It appeared that there was a counter sitting in the far back, but I could barely even see it through the staggering piles of antique items that swallowed the entire store. I could make out delicate china, instant snacks, painted clay pots, and even a full suit of armor sitting in the midst of the mess.

There were far too many products for me to count, or even take note of. There was too many objects, too little space, that the room quickly became cramped and suffocating, quivering with the possibility of a collapse. In fact, it could barely house Kyoko and I as we stepped our way over fallen items and into the clump that is the school store.

"Looks like there's plenty of stuff in here." I voiced my thoughts out loud as my gaze flittered across the packed room, jammed tight with all sorts of unique items. It ranged from Western to Japanese to Hawaiian, and so many more cultures that this room alone became a melting pot. I eyed a fresh package of rolled up bandages sitting on the dark oak shelf towards the back, and instantly snatched it up into my hands. "A lot of them seem helpful."

Kyoko only gave me a low hum of approval as she continued to wordlessly poke through the towering amount of gifts and purchases. Her eyebrows were furrowed in deep concentration, as if she was looking for something of importance inside all the heaping piles of different unique items. I thought not to disturb her search, and decided to look for some significant tools myself. I gently placed the box of bandages back where I found it, and began my own search throughout the store.

I tried my very best not to knock over any of the wobbling mounds of collectables when I dug deeper into the stockpile using my bare hands. They have now seemed to cool off from the pain, so I found no difficulty in replacing and shoving away unneeded items. As I pushed away ginormous stuffed animals and fake display swords, I found a churning determination stirring inside my body. I had some hope: even if it was just a tiny bit, even if it could be easily shadowed by despair, I still grasped onto hope. Hope that we would find something crucial, hope that we could escape.

"Did you find anything?" I heard Kyoko call out to me from her corner of the room. It had now been some while after we first began ravaging the school store, yet I still could not unearth anything merely noteworthiness.

Frustration began to exude from my body, sore from bending over in one position for so long. Judging from her tone of voice, I could tell that her discoveries were all fruitless as well. I was just about to answer with my great disappointment when something, something rather shiny, I should say, caught the corner of my fatigued, strained eyes. I turned to uncover what it was out of pure curiosity, and when I did, my breath immediately got caught inside my drying throat.

What seemed to be an oversized plush doll of Monokuma laid floating on its back in the sea of clutter. It was a standard stuffed animal with dizzying, on spot details all too similar to the ones found on the actual robot. Almost lifelike, it seemed, as if it could easily stand up on its own and walk away from its spot. However, my focus wasn't drawn on the Monokuma replica; in fact, in the midst of my alarm, I barely even saw it at first.

Stabbed cleanly into the chest of the doll was a petrifying, sizable knife adorned with a silver handle.

My eyes widened at once. Everything that I have found so far inside the store were mere harmless items that could easily be given as gifts, nothing of the hazardous sort. This huge, wide knife, sticking straight out from the soft breast of the Monokuma plush was so out of place, so noticeably contrast, that my head spun in circles of instinctive dread. What was a weapon doing here inside of a harmless school store?

Kyoko seemed to have noticed my lack of response, because I heard her call back, "What's wrong? Found anything?" I could feel her gaze burn holes into my shoulder blades as I swallowed my panic forcibly, my parched saliva scorching the tender insides of my esophagus. My voice had lost itself for the nth time this day, and I could not find it no matter where I looked. An unnerving sense of anxiety spread across every inch of my body, and I stood frozen in disbelief.

Cautiously, I slowly began to reach for the humongous stuffed Monokuma, straining my arms as far as they could reach to recover it. I barely grazed its plush foot, and I used the tips of my fingers to snag the doll into my inventory. It took a fair amount of my strength to retrieve the plush, as it was weighed down by the hefty, bulky knife that stabbed almost straight through the doll.

Releasing a vigorous breath from my compressed chest, I clutched the stuffed animal in between my two hands, turning it around in multiple directions to analyze the surface. It appeared that the only item stuck inside of this Monokuma was the knife, and I felt a mixture of relief and regret tingle at the nerves inside my body.

Using one hand, I grabbed a hold of the thick, silvery handle, wrapping all five of my fingers around the cumbersome haft. The cool, brass surface iced my throbbing fingertips as soon as I scraped my skin across the metal. My heart made a home inside of my throat, breathing a heavy, rapid pace of its own that echoed inside my hollow ears. With great labor, I then yanked the knife clean from the grasp of the Monokuma doll.

Unconsciously, an alarmed gasp fluttered out of my voice box, and I dropped the stuffed animal at once, almost staggering back into the cluttered piles of collectables. It fell onto the cold, dead floor with a soft heap, rolling ever so slightly to its side. But I paid not one bit of attention to the doll, for all I could see out of my blurring vision was the weapon I had just unsheathed.

The knife, once out of its unusual sheath, was far heavier and bigger than I had originally thought. It bore a long, curved blade of steel embellished with stretched out stripes of ink. The bolster was considerably large in size, colored a deep, dark brown hue that hovered much closer to black. It was quite a strange shape too: the bolster was chunky, jagged, wide, and just the faintest bit familiar. With raw horror, I realized that it was the exact same shape as Monokuma's wicked red eye.

"Junko?" I could barely hear Kyoko ask over the shrill ringing of my own ears. My hands trembled from distress, daring to drop the weighty blade onto my own two feet. I gripped the handle of the knife so tightly, my knuckles paled and my sharp nails cut crescents into my flesh. My mind tumbled across a sea of doubt as I tried desperately to fish for an answer, only to find no such luck. I couldn't explain the sudden and odd appearance of this knife. 

"I-I found something." My lips whispered the words I tried to force out, my voice merely a rasp sitting on top of my tongue. I cautiously turned my back to face Kyoko, gingerly holding up the enormous blade for her to see. And when she did, her eyes rapidly widened in panic, and it was the most emotion I'd seen come from her all day.

"Where did you find that?" She interrogated like a police officer questioning a wanted criminal. I felt impure, filthy, just by holding this knife alone, but I knew I couldn't just let it fall to the ground. Instead, I shook my head and shakily pointed to the doll lying face first on the tile floor. 

"It-it was inside this Monokuma plush-" I tried to begin.

"Hold it!" My blood stopped its flow inside my veins immediately at the sound of that sickening voice, freezing up entirely in absolute terror. I became paralyzed, unable to move, or breathe, or even think. All I could do was watch behind horrified eyes as Monokuma himself burst into the once peaceful school store.

"Where did you find that?" He yelled furiously at me, his voice harsh and demanding. The ferocity he carried in his exclamations halted my heartbeat, and I found myself trapped in an utterly hopeless situation that I couldn't escape from, no matter how hard I tried. I could not find any words to express my shock, so I meekly pointed to the plush doll stretched out on the ground.

I had never been so terrified of a two foot tall robotic bear before, but today was certainly a day full of firsts. I could not even muster enough strength to protest when he hastily swooped up the blade from my tight grasp and into his. All I could do was stand still, frozen, gaping, gawking.

Kyoko spoke for me instead. "What's so special about that knife, Monokuma?" She questioned with tranquil wonder, intensely contrasting my period of bewilderment.

"What's so special?" Monokuma echoed, his pent up wrath finally bursting at its seams. He vigorously threw his paws straight up to the air, daring to let the heavy knife inside his clutch fly into the open air. I flinched on instinct, wincing at an invisible pain that pierced through my skin. "That's my knife! Of course it's special!"

"Then why is it here, inside the school store?" Kyoko rebutted, refusing to let the conversation slip from her grip. She continued to press the matter harder and harder. 

"Well, how am I supposed to know that?" Monokuma was purely exasperated by our antics, shaking his head low with frustration. "You naughty little kids, touching other people's belongings without permission. That alone deserves a punishment!"

My breathing was instantly squeezed out of my lungs from the massive pressure that crushed my ribcage. "N-No! I was just-"

"But that wasn't stated in the rules, wasn't it?" Kyoko mentioned to the bear. Some resemblance of a smirk played across her lips as she resumed her intelligible preach, "There's nothing in the school regulations that say we must be punished for picking up what we find. However, it _did_ permit us to search the school to our own extent, no? So if you punish us for merely searching the building in peace, that would indeed be breaking the rules."

As I blinked furiously, utterly amazed by her extraordinary wit, Monokuma grumbled a sling of incoherent curses underneath his breath. With a hefty, much exaggerated sigh of irritation, he snapped, "Fine. I guess you're Miss Right this time. But that doesn't mean you can do around touching my stuff! The next time I catch you fingering with some important item of mine, it's on sight!"

And leaving us with that final warning, he hobbled out of the room, dispirited and still fuming with rage, his paw clamped tight over the curvy blade. He ambled rather angrily, and I wondered what he was so upset for. It was only a knife, after all, but perhaps it meant something to him.

I watched as he slowly, yet surely, disappeared from our sight, to where, I hadn't a clue. My chest was still heaving with all of its might, even long after he left the store. I stared down at my now empty palms, regret instantaneously washing over my quivering body. I loathed how easily I was intimidated by Monokuma, yet at the same time, I felt as if it was necessary to be this cautious. I feared setting him off the wrong foot, for he could end my life on the spot with no problem at all. I felt my fingers clench over empty, hollow air. 

"I wonder what that was all about," Kyoko spoke, her chin cupped inside her fingers. When I gazed back up to look at her, I noticed for the first time that she was wearing slim, form fitting gloves embedded with rhinestones. I pondered silently to myself about the secrets she hid underneath those dark purple mitts. "He seemed awfully upset."

I let my shoulders droop in deep remorse, letting a breathy sigh of disappointment escape my lips. "Sorry for being so reckless back there. I had no idea." I apologized awkwardly.

"It's fine, really. What worries me more is the knife itself." She reassured with a flat, hollow voice. "I can only imagine how many weapons he owns."

I squinted at where the Monokuma plush once stood, my vision clouding over with fresh trauma. After that incident with Monokuma himself, I was pretty disturbed and discouraged from any hope I had remaining to continue searching the store. I felt the urge to leave as soon as possible. "Maybe we should explore somewhere else, to get a better idea of the school's structure."

Her pointed, distant eyes were shiny with consideration as she soaked up my suggestion. She nodded once before dropping her arms to her sides and replying, "Let's check out one of the classrooms, then. I think there is nothing more to be searched in here, unfortunately."

I gave her a grim, tight lipped smile. "Lead the way."

She turned her back on me with one, swift pivot of her heel, and pushed her way out of the room, leaving me in stunned, substantial stillness. But not long after, I found the courage to jog after her, afraid of what would happen if I were left here alone.

The hallways were dead silent, almost too quiet for comfort as we walked back out into the corridor. I figured I could never get quite used to this place, for it was far too chilling for me to be at ease.

There was no way in hell I would choose to roam these floors by myself. It was considered suicidal in my head to be left vulnerable and alone inside of this perilous killing school life. I instead timidly trailed after Kyoko as she weaved her way through the entangled labyrinth of the school halls. I didn't question her navigation this time around: I was too shaken up by my most recent, unpleasant visit from Monokuma that I couldn't find the bravery to ask such things. 

With no one to converse with, I grabbed a hold of both elbows using my two hands, folding my arms closely against my hammering chest. There was some sort of nagging, sour knot where my heart laid, and I quickly began to produce overwrought thoughts in response to my rapid heart rate. The icy sting the air carried stabbed into my unprotected skin, and nipped furiously at my flesh, eager to steal some of my warmth. I wordlessly prayed that we would arrive wherever we need to go soon enough.

Thankfully, our journey this time around was much shorter in length than the previous one. Only a few minutes after we departed from the store, she stopped in front of a dim, dingy classroom at the far end of the hallway. I halted right behind her steps and spared our landing place a quick glance. On mere sight, I immediately felt goosebumps overtake my arms, and I tried to rub them down with any remaining warmth inside my palms. I sucked in a soundless breath.

"I was hoping to find an intriguing classroom somewhere here," she elaborated on her odd choice of destination. "This one looks interesting, don't you agree?"

I could not find any reason to argue with her. The sliding wooden doors of the classroom were almost completely unhinged from their spots, threatening to fall apart at any given moment. Dirt and debris piled on the tile floor that surrounded the room, giving off a rotten, muddy odor that reeked of old age. The stale windows were smashed clean, only leaving behind a few jagged teeth extruding from the top and bottom edges of the dusty window frame.

I attempted to peer inside the classroom through the gaping, broken windows by narrowing my eyes, but it was all in vain. The room was too dark for any light to reach, much less for my eyes to be able to see through it. I gave up on trying to peek inside and figure that if I desired to look inside, I must enter it.

"Let's have a look inside, shall we?" Kyoko offered, stepping towards the abandoned, disorderly, and most of all, horrifying classroom. Unlike me, her demeanor was completely calm and relaxed, as if she had absolutely nothing to fear inside this haunted school of sorts. She reached a motionless hand for the deranged, rusty handle and gently placed her fingers on top of it. Then, without trouble, she yanked the crumbling door open.

At once, cobwebs and soot began to tumble downwards, originating from where, I could not guess. They softly piled on top of each other on the ground, forming a flat, brown mound of dirt and scraps, and the pale tiles on the floor were immediately stained with a film of dust. Kyoko, unbothered by this all, elegantly stepped over the collecting heap and into the classroom. I mirrored her exact steps and leapt over the pile of mire, careful not to trip over my own heels.

The classroom in question looked anything but a place for learning. If I had to come up with a room that resembled this one the closest, I would say a dungeon.

The once clean walls were licked with filth all on sides, carefully decorated with long, immoral slash marks made from some sort of blade. The ceiling lights were utterly broken, to the extent where one of them had lost its grip and aggressively crashed onto an underlying desk, shattering almost thoroughly.

Every table and chair that had unfortunately found its way inside this room had been overturned, rusted to no end, and dismantled into unrecognizable pieces. The cracked ground was adhesive with a thick, unknown dark substance, and I severely hoped that it was not indeed human blood. 

A decayed, befoul smell hung in the heavy, dusty air, making it nearly impossible to breathe. The grime forced its way into my healing lungs, and I choked on mere air, coughing into the crook of my arm. The atmosphere was so dark, so hopeless, so dirty, that it sent an endless series of shivers down my back and into my bloodstream. Every hair on my body erected, stilling just like their owner. My legs dared to give out under my weight, and trembled from the hazardous doses of fear that washed over my entire body. My tongue lost its ability to be able to speak, and I remained speechless at the petrifying sight of the distorted classroom. 

"Interesting." I heard Kyoko mumble, nodding her head at the atrocious view. She looked more engrossed than any other emotion, especially not terror. I could see her eyes flitting across the room, searching for any signs of disturbance or clues of danger. "I wonder what happened here."

"Yeah." I shivered, clutching firmly onto my trembly arms. Despite me agreeing with her previous statement, I think our intents of searching this unusual classroom were rather different. 

"How about we take a look around? We might uncover some clues." She suggested, nodding her head already at my nonexistent answer. Eager was not quite the right word to describe her, but she was indeed keen on beginning to dig. I watched, stationary with sharp fright, and wide eyed with paralyzing anticipation, as she started to poke her way through the filthy classroom at once.

She showed absolutely no signs of distress or disgust as she carefully pushed past disorderly desks and wine stained chairs. In fact, she seemed to be more comfortable searching here in this appalling room than she was interacting with the others at the main hall. It was like as if she was raised from an early age to uncover and detect places full of concerning mystery, just like herself.

As I gawked at her thorough - perhaps a bit too thorough - investigation, I silently scolded myself for being too frozen. I needed to make at least some progress, and I couldn't leave Kyoko to search this cluttered room on her own. So I gave all the nerves in my body a kick, and suddenly, I was in touch with reality again.

However, although I was fully aware of my surroundings now, I did not know where to begin looking. Everything inside the classroom, from the torn books sprawled in the corner, to the disorderly heap of desks, to the hanging, split ceiling light, was too much. Far too much to comprehend as real. I felt my teeth snag my lower lip in deep consideration. Where would I even start?

After giving much thought to my variety of options, I decided I would begin in the darkest corner, all the way in the back of the room, where no light could ever possibly reach. Perhaps there was something worthwhile lurking in the depths of the unexplored nooks of the classroom. With that thought in mind, I forced my legs into action and they obediently carried my weight to the back.

There were a few overturned, splintered desks piled on top of one another in the corner, all bearing rusty metal legs and dust coated surfaces. I bent over at my waist to get a deeper inspection of the dismantled tables, and gripped the flesh of my bare thighs with my hands until they paled as if losing blood flow.

I did not reach out a single limb to physically dig through the mess myself: I was too cautious that I would either hurt myself somehow, or disturb the repulsive yet oddly tranquil peace of the classroom. My eyes traced the deliberate details of each fragmented desk, spiritually rummaging through the unsorted mound.

Each leg was snapped in half, jutting out like shiny broken bones from a human's crushed body. A fine film of grime settled on top, tainting the legs into impurity. There was some kind of dye splattered onto the metallic surfaces, and I reached out a single finger to lightly graze its face. When I pulled back, some kind of sienna tinted powder clung onto my fingertips. I rubbed my index finger and thumb together, and discovered that the substance was quite thick and glossy. I tried hard not to focus too much on the chemical components of this unknown medium, and uncomfortably resumed my search.

The tabletop surfaces of the smashed in desks were cracked severely, appearing rather similar to shattered glass. Dust had too found its way onto the wood, dulling the once bright oak to a depressing hazel hue. I swiped a swift fingertip onto one of the splintered surfaces to collect some of the dust particles, and found it clinging onto my skin. I propelled a single breath onto my hand, and sent most of the dirt flying away into oblivion before it settled onto the begrimed tile floor. But that was not nearly enough to cleanse my finger completely from filth, so I blew once again, with more force, this time. Disappointed from the lack of response the dust molecules gave me, I eventually just scrubbed my hand against the soft fabric of my skirt to wipe any remaining soot.

However, my embarrassing struggle was not in vain, as I had now cleared a bit of the desk's surface, revealing a most interesting feature underneath. I peered just a bit closer, eager to discover what I had unearthed, to see a severe series of slashes cutting deep into the rotting wood.

I squinted hard at the incomprehensible carvings running through the tabletop, but I simply could not make out a thing. At first glance, they seemed to be Kanji characters, but when I studied the cuts harder, I could not see anything that sparked familiarity within my brain. If there even was any words struck onto the surface, they were all ineligible, and I gave up on trying to figure out what they spelled.

I ran the very tips of my fingers across the slits, tracing each deliberate curve underneath my skin. I hope to have gained some information about these unusual slashes, but my brain was utterly empty of ideas. With a sigh, I raised my hand off of the filthy surface and half heartedly wiped off the dirt on my black cardigan. I was forced to admit that there was nothing of use here in this dingy corner of sorts, deepening my dispiritedness. I straightened my arched back and backed away from the area, now in search of a new place to investigate.

"Did you find anything important?" I asked Kyoko, cautiously stepping over fractured remains of chairs and collapsed tables. I grimaced at each sticky step I took, wincing at the bizarre sensation underfoot.

"Not yet." She still sounded confident that there was indeed something of importance hidden inside this room. She began to dig underneath the teacher's desk, crawling on her knees to get a better look. She even flattened her chest onto the grimy ground and slithered out of my sight to somewhere behind the counter. I, struck in awe, admired her passionate determination and pumped my own resolution by dropping on all fours to probe the underside of the only standing desktop. 

There was little to no light shedding inside of this dim classroom, so it was almost impossible to see anything. I blindly groped the sides of the desk, clinging onto the splintered edges, and narrowed my eyes in the dark, hoping that by doing so, I would uncover something. However, it did little to aid my inconvenience, and I was stuck with relying on only my hands and intuition to take me places. 

I let out a low grumble of annoyance as I began to sightlessly rummage underneath the desk, unpleasantly bumping my head against the underside more than once. I placed my palms against the rough bottom of the desk, feeling every crack and chip of wood poking out from the table.

As I extended my fingertips to get a sense of the lower face of the table, I felt some grooves in the soft, expiring wood. I furiously rubbed my finger over the depressions, trying to find an explanation behind the out of place cuts, when I felt a sliver of sharp wood stab into my flesh.

I retracted my hand at once, hissing a silent breath in my wordless, agonizing pain, and decided to avoid mindlessly touching things without my sight.

I covered each and every inch of the table's underside, but I still could not find a single clue or discovery. The most that I could recover was a wad of chewed, stale gum stuck underneath the desk, possibly from a former student. It was hardened and dense with age, and it took me quite some while to come to the realization that it was indeed a piece of gum. With a sudden feeling of disgust crawling all over my skin, like bedbugs, I scrambled from underneath the table in a hurry. 

"Looks like there's nothing much here." I claimed with defeat, creeping up to my feet and stabilizing my unbalanced body with the edge of the nearby desk. As my head cleared up from its previous, puzzled cloudiness, I frowned and shook my head from side to side; I was almost certain that there was something we were missing. This classroom definitely held more clues than ones visible, otherwise, why else would it be so suspicious? There must be a reason as to why it was so shaken up and beaten. It did not make any sense to me.

"No, I'm sure there's more to it." Kyoko insisted from someplace unknown in the classroom. I glanced all around the room to find her whereabouts, only to see her standing up from behind the teacher's desk. "I'm going to do some more thorough investigation here. You can go ahead and inform the others about our discoveries."

"Are you sure? I kinda don't want to leave you here alone..." My voice trailed off as she sent a piercing glare at me, her eyes glinting silver with a heroine-like ferocity. My heart skipped a beat in its rhythm from her suffocating intensity, and immediately shrunk in great intimidation.

"Don't worry about me." She said, her tone so unshaken and bold, I believed her every word. "I'll be just fine. There's just some things I want to explore a bit further before telling the class. I'll see you at the dining hall."

I shifted my gaze to look elsewhere, contemplating whether I should depart or not. I was certainly not looking forward to wandering the unsettling halls of the school alone, but I indubitably did not want to upset Kyoko either. I figured that she was well aware with what she was doing, for she seemed so confident, I couldn't possibly doubt her. So, with a deep breath of trust, I finally spoke, "Alright, then. Promise me you'll be safe?"

She gave me a knowing smirk, seemingly to understand more than I could possibly ever. "I'll be alright, don't worry about that."

I deeply respected her bravery and independence, as if she was born and raised on a battlefield, trained to fight ever since she let out her first cry. It was impressive how dedicated and fearless she was, and I aspired to be as solid as she. 

However, when I stepped foot out of the bloody, horrifying classroom at last, I found myself suddenly doubting my abilities. My chest felt hefty, like there was an unknown weight crushing down on my meek, quivering lungs. I sucked in an icy breath, feeling its frigidity conquer every nerve inside my body. Using a shaky, reluctant hand, I slid the door to a shut behind me, leaving Kyoko by herself inside.

As soon as I began to take my first steps into the empty, freezing hallways, I felt an immediate chill run up my spine, as if it were hungrily chasing an invisible being inside my bloodstream. My instinct was to instantly shudder, forcing a short, jagged puff of air out from my lips. I could almost taste my sour fear resting on the tip of my tongue, threatening to slip out as a panicked shout or loose whimper.

I gritted my teeth to keep the nagging anxiety caged deep within me as I hunched my shoulders and continued my way down the hall.

For a split second, only a split second, I believed that the rest of the students had disappeared from the school without any notice. It was silent, way too silent, as I trudged from corridor to corridor, turn to turn, and deeper into the maze called Hope's Peak Academy.

I did not hear even the slightest stir, or even a faraway exclamation, tricking my mind into considering the possibility that they had all vanished. But I dismissed the thought as soon as it turned up inside my consciousness. There was absolutely no way I was all alone here in this building, I firmly assured myself, scolding my mind, even, for proposing such things. Everybody else must be at the dining hall already, awaiting my delayed arrival.

My only map of the school were the signs pointing directions hanging overhead. They greatly assisted me in navigating the immeasurable structure, even if it was only the first floor.

I told myself that if what Monokuma said was true, and if I really was stuck here until the end of time, I needed to become quite familiar with the building. Yet for now, I heavily relied on the signs to take me to my destination, my thankfulness for the source growing with each second that passed. 

But as great as they were, I did find myself getting lost multiple times in this tangled web of hallways. I backtracked and retraced my steps more times than desired, letting out several deep, distressing sighs of irritancy. I quickly grew frustrated in my inability to comprehend simple, given directions, and when I finally came across the long awaited dining hall, I was in rather a bad mood.

When I pried the surprisingly weighty twin doors open, the first thing to greet me was Kiyotaka's penetrating voice, shooting like an arrow in the still, surrounding air.

"Miss Enoshima!" He called me out as soon as I stepped inside the extensive room. He jabbed a stern, lecturing finger towards my direction. "You are tardy! Do you have an excuse for this time?"

I furiously blinked, drowning in the overwhelming presence of everybody in the hall. After spending so much time alone with Kyoko, it seemed unnatural and frankly a bit uncomfortable to be packed with thirteen other students in a single, long dining table. Especially when their eyes trained on me like a pack of ravenous, rabid wolves, ready to devour my response to the unanswerable question. I opened and closed my mouth not once, but twice, trying to fish for some sort of pretext that I could pass off as a reply.

"Uh, I was looking around the school? With Kyoko?" I managed to squeeze out, utterly cringing at how faltering and unsure my voice sounded. "That's what you were all doing too, right?" 

He furrowed his thick eyebrows, trying critically to comprehend my lame return. "Please inform us if you were going to use more time! We've been waiting for ten minutes for you two to show up!"

I did not believe it was that long since we first departed from the gym to begin our search, but apparently, I had spent quite some time poking inside the school store and faraway classroom. I shook my head, too stunned to even muster another reply, and found an empty spot beside him and Mondo.

With somewhat of an embarrassed sigh, I silently slid into my seat and rested my arms on the table's smooth, ceramic surface, folding my hands into the nooks of my bare elbows. I bit back an inaudible shiver at the icy sensation that radiated from the backs of my palms. 

"Speaking of which," said Celeste from her spot across the table. "Where is Kyoko anyway? I thought she went with you, no?"

I hesitated to inform the rest of the students about the haunting, gory classroom Kyoko and I discovered earlier. I didn't know how they would each react to such things, and the last thing I wanted was for everyone to spiral into panic. So I held back the truth like a bullet waiting to be shot, and said in place, "She... told be she would catch up later. She's still investigating, I guess."

Leon tipped his chair all the way back, amusingly trying to balance out his weight. He ruffled his fiery, spiky hair in drowsy consideration. "Well, maybe Junko killed her?" 

My eyes grew wide at his unexpected accusation and my back erected with disbelief. "Wh-What? I didn't kill anyone!" I immediately came to my own defense, afraid that people would begin to doubt and distrust me.

He merely hummed as a response, although he did look like he was half joking about the possible murder. I did not know how to react to that, so I simply shook my head and sank back into my seat. 

Kiyotaka did not let his retort slip past as easily as I did. "Leon! This is not the time to be accusing each other for murder!" He yelled, and Leon quickly put his hands up in instant surrender. "We need to be working together to escape, not pointing useless fingers!" Leon, in response, muttered a sling of incoherent excuses under his breath before leaning back into his chair once again.

Kiyotaka cleared his throat once and arose from his seat. He forcefully slammed his palms against the marble tabletop, making Chihiro, Yasuhiro, and Makoto all flinch. "Now then, I declare that the first session of the Hope's Peak Academy briefing meetings has begun!" He ordered, his voice loud and clear, carrying enough volume to be heard across the globe.

"Jesus Christ." I heard Mondo grumble lowly beside me, informally resting his legs on top of the table.

"Let's present the results of our investigation and share our information!" Kiyotaka continued without any acknowledgment of his spiteful comments. "I will start first." He straightened his back and positioned himself into a speaking pose. "I spent some time looking around the dormitory, and there, I made the discover of the century! I found that there was exactly one room for each person!"

"Well yeah, I figured that out before anything else..." Aoi remarked, shaking her head in the slightest disappointment.

"Each door already has a nameplate on it, so I guess all the rooms have been assigned already." added Makoto, appearing to be deep in consuming ponder. "I wonder why." 

Sakura spoke next, nodding her head once at the previous remarks. "And each room key was attached to a keychain with the owner's name precision-etched onto it."

Preassigned dorm rooms, I thought to myself. It would be better if I found mine before doing anything abnormally crazy. The mention of a private sleeping quarters put a bit of ease into my mind, and I felt an overpowering sense of sleepiness tugging at my consciousness already. 

"And Makoto and I found out that all the rooms are completely soundproof," mentioned Sayaka. "Your next-door neighbor could scream their lungs out, and you wouldn't hear a thing."

Celeste was the next to add a comment about the dorm rooms. "Well, each room also had a private bathroom, which could also lock." She had a pleasant smile toying with her lips, and her expression was found unreadable.

"But it looked like there were only locks on the bathrooms in the girls' dorms," Makoto inputted. "I checked my own and it couldn't lock."

I was busying myself with scribbling down notes inside my head to remember for later. Each and every piece of information held much value in a place like this, and we needed to know everything in order to live properly.

"Okay, so they got a bunch of rooms ready for us." Mondo scowled, folding his arms behind his head apathetically. "They're assuming we're gonna be here a while..."

"Well, better to have than have not!" Kiyotaka interrupted with much optimism that clashed against Mondo's pessimism. "At least we don't have to worry about surviving like wild animals."

"W-Well, is that all you have to r-report, Mr. Honor S-Student?" Toko retorted from her spot, far away from everybody else. She stood motionlessly at a small table for two behind me, fiddling with the ends of her long, dark purple braids. 

Kiyotaka took a slight moment to prepare his lecturing answer, but decided in the end to ultimately go against it. "That's all for my report! Let's move on to whoever's next!"

"I guess I can go." Leon offered, sitting straight and letting the legs of his chair fall flat against the floor. "Me, Mondo, Yasuhiro, and Chihiro went around searching for any signs of escape."

I heard Toko grumble something about grammatical issues before being quickly cut off by Mondo adding, "I went back to the main hall, thinking maybe we could destroy that giant hunk of metal." He said, crossing his arms heftily over his broad chest. "I hit it with desks and chairs and practically everything I could find. Hell, I even got Sakura to try and help me out. Still, it wouldn't budge. It was as hard as steel!"

Celeste twirled a strand of loose, black hair around one slim, pale finger. "Well, yes, it _is_ made of steel."

"Anyway," Mondo finished, tilting back a few degrees in his chair. I felt a strange rush of paranoia and concern for his safety. "If we're gonna get outta here, it's not gonna be through there."

"So we went up and down the school, double-checking the windows in all the hallways and classes." Leon picked up where he had left off. "We wanted to see if we could get any of those metal plates to come off. But we couldn't a single damn screw to budge even a little bit."

"There's no hope of escaping," Chihiro added quietly, her words seeming to tremble and shake with uncontrollable alarm. "The school as totally been cut off."

"It fuckin' sucks. Like really, really, really bad." Mondo groaned out of pure vexation. "What the hell are we gonna do?"

"Calm down! You're starting to make me nervous!" Leon stuttered out, breaking out into a troubled, cold sweat. "I-I'm sure there's more to this school, yeah? Hopefully some more ways out?"

"Aoi and I _did_ find a set of stairs leading up to another floor, in both the school and dorm areas," Sakura nodded in response to Leon's desperate inquires. "But there were gates there, and we couldn't find any ways to open them, so we could not check it out."

"So, at this point, we're only able to search the first floor." Aoi said, visibly disheartened. "I was really hoping for another way out, like, a window to jump out of or something!"

"I'm pretty sure the only place you're going after that is Hell." Leon muttered, shaking his head in disapproval.

"Well, who else partnered up and searched the school?" Sayaka questioned, deserting Leon's unneeded comment in the dust. 

"Hifumi and I were left to join together," said Celeste, playing with her hair tediously. "If I am being honest, I can't quite say we acted as one. Rather, we did _nothing_ as one. I immediately left to investigate on my own."

"Well, what did you do then, Hifumi?" Kiyotaka interrogated at once, shooting a long, judgmental stare at him. Hifumi began to panic as soon as the words left Kiyotaka's mouth, chewing on his nails frantically.

"I-I just stood around in the gym," he admitted with great difficulty. "I was too afraid to go off on my own, so I stayed there..."

"Good God," Kiyotaka appeared quite crestfallen, shaking his head with deep sighs of disappointment. "In a situation like this, we need to all pull our equal weight!"

"I was scared, okay?" Hifumi yelled back, cornered into a tight, uncomfortable place in mind.

"Alright guys, everybody just calm down, okay?" said Yasuhiro, reaching for behind his head. "All this stress is bad for your skin, y'know?"

"What about Byakuya? Did you find anything?" asked Kiyotaka, but it resembled more of a demand. Yet, still as unbothered as ever, Byakuya crossed his arms firmly across his chest and presented a rather straightforward response.

"I wanted to try and find some clue as to who's responsible for imprisoning us here," he said without any shame. "But unfortunately, I made no such discoveries. That's all from me."

"How about Toko? She followed you, did she not?" Celeste mentioned. Byakuya simply scoffed at the mention of the girl who stood next to him, distant from the rest of the group.

"She did not have anything to contribute," he spat. "All she did was trail after me like a hungry dog begging for treats."

"So, she didn't do _any_ investigating?" Makoto's eyes were wide with a refusal to believe. "What were you thinking?"

"W-Well, it's not like a-any of you would t-take me anyway!" She hissed out, glaring sharply at him, as if he had just offended her whole family line. "I-I figured, I would j-just find someone by myself!"

"If you wanted to go with someone, you should've just said something." He said, letting his shoulders drop and relax.

Toko did not take his response well. "Like I'd want to go anywhere with a dirty s-slut like you..." She mumbled, gritting her teeth.

Makoto's jaw dropped with utter shock. "Slut?" 

"Where did you get that from-" I began to butt in, but she didn't want to hear any of what I had to say.

"Y-You too, Magazine Girl!" She spluttered with wrath of an unknown origin. "You two c-can be sluts together!"

I had no words left to say anything more, because I was stunned into such disturbance, I couldn't utter a single sound. It is without a doubt that I heard such insults thrown at me before, but they were all shot from behind faceless profiles on the Internet, slandering my position as a popular model. To hear it to my face, it was certainly a personal attack that I took to heart. 

"Stop fighting, you!" Sayaka exclaimed, bursting into our arising conflict. "Stop getting off topic! We're discussing important matters here!"

Toko retreated into her corner of the hall, mumbling profane defamations underneath her breath as she averted her gaze on command. Makoto and I remained in our states of complete shock, and we gave each other an exchange of glances that wordlessly communicated our discomfort and offense.

"Anyways, I wanted to mention that I had a look around the dining hall," Sayaka tried her hardest to steer us back on track, ignoring the previous, fresh quarrel. "I found a fridge in the back of the kitchen, and it was overflowing with all kinds of stuff." She gave us all a reassuring, sisterly smile that almost cleared all my memories of my latest dispute. "I guess we don't have to worry about food, at least."

However, from her bright and cheery words, Hifumi seemed to have been discouraged, as he gazed down to the floor in defeat. "Sure, for now. But even with all that, how long can the food last for the fifteen of us?"

Sayaka let a small giggle escape from her lips. "I don't think we have to worry about that. All the food gets restocked automatically each day." Her eyes clouded with sudden, unexplainable doubt. "At least, that's what Monokuma told me..."

I found myself quickly recovering from my previous, frozen period of disbelief. "Huh? You saw him?" I asked, recalling when the bear in question had so suddenly barged into the school store and threatened me over a simple knife. Sayaka gave me a confident, solid nod.

"Yeah, he came out of nowhere while I was checking the fridge, told me that, then disappeared again." She elaborated. "He was so fast, I can't believe someone could have been moving him around with a remote control."

"I saw him too," I heard myself say, as I couldn't keep the truth inside me for any longer. "While Kyoko and I were checking out the school store, he appeared and yelled at me for picking up a knife."

"You saw Monokuma too?" exclaimed Chihiro, eyes big with terror.

"There's a school store?" questioned Aoi, her voice rising with enthusiasm and curiosity alike.

"You found a knife?" screamed Hifumi, sweat dripping from his forehead in alarm.

"There is more that we have found," a monotonous voice sliced cleanly through the atmosphere, thick and murky with high tension and pointed edginess. I turned inside my seat, heart caught inside my throat by the unforeseen interruption, to discover that Kyoko silently standing at the doorway of the dining hall.

Kiyotaka arose at once. He pointed a finger at her, shouting with huge vigor, "Kyoko! Where the heck have you been! We already started the meeting without you!"

She said nothing in response to his accusations. Instead, she swiftly paced to our table, soundless and still like an elegant shadow, and dropped a single sheet of paper on the surface.

It was far from new, it seemed. The edges were torn clean, the once snowy face was stained a revolting pale brown, and it was cracked all over from old age. The paper slid the tiniest bit from the lack of friction the marble tabletop held. It was nudged towards me, and I instantly stood to my feet to examine the paper in front of my eyes. "Huh? What's this...?" I squinted my eyes at what seemed to be a diagram of sorts printed on the surface.

"It appears to be a map of Hope's Peak Academy." replied Kyoko, not hesitating at all to give out all her known information. I could feel my eyes widen in their sockets as I stared down at the layout of the building.

"A map?" I muttered, my head brimming with unanswered questions. The first being, where did she find this? Certainly, not while we were together. She made no mention of discovering any map, or anything, for that matter. Using the process of elimination, and judging from the worn appearance of the paper, I could only guess she found it inside the brute, mysterious classroom we had investigated not too long ago. 

"Wh-What the?" Kiyotaka stared down at the map behind quivering, unbelieving eyes. He bit his lip out of raw, gnawing anticipation. "Where did you find this?"

"It doesn't matter where I found it," she defended, her voice compressing and hard. "Look at what's printed on the map."

Everyone seated at the table began to lean forward, like magnets being drawn by a bigger, consuming force. Murmurs and whispers were passed around as we all took a glance at the beaten piece of paper Kyoko had unearthed from this school. She was the only one to go as far as finding something attainable from this building, which immediately grabbed almost, if not all, of our attention.

"It's an exact copy of Hope's Peak Academy's construction," she explained without waiting for an answer. "Which means that this building we're trapped in is indeed the prestigious school we all got accepted into."

"So..." Chihiro began to back away from the growing crowd surrounding the table. "We didn't get kidnapped and taken to some other place. This is really Hope's Peak..."

"So stupid it's not even possible," Mondo disagreed with a menacing growl rising from his throat. He clenched all of his fingers into a fist, as if tensing for another fight to break out. " _This_ is where the country's future elite are supposed to come and learn?"

Aoi appeared to have differing, concerning questions. "But if this is really Hope's Peak, where are all the other students?" 

That was the exact inquiry I was doubting from my very first moments in this school. The last time I checked, Hope's Peak Academy was chock full of promising, young students. And now, there was only the fifteen of us. What could've possibly happened to the remaining classes here?

"I'm sure this was all planned out," Yasuhiro was at complete ease, contrasting the rest of our worry so severely, it was almost frightening. He even gave a short, lighthearted laugh to prove his point. "The people in charge of Hope's Peak put this all together, right?"

Toko shot daggers at his jolly behavior, her eyes dark with distrust. "Wh-What's your problem? What's so funny?" She forced a hard, dry lump down her throat, trembling with a mixture of outrage and horror. "We d-didn't find a way out, didn't f-find who's behind all of this. We still have no idea what's g-going on!"

Celeste cupped a gentle hand to her mouth, her expression painted with surprise. "Huh? Is it not crystal clear to you what is going on?" She leaned forward to look her straight in the eye, giving Toko a look so unnerving, even I felt quite disturbed. "It is perfectly obvious that we have been imprisoned in here, with no way out. Is that not clear?"

Her words stabbed a painful spear of reality through my beating heart. I felt my voice rise in my esophagus, before quickly dying before it could find any words to carry. As much as I wanted to deny it over and over and over again, I could not escape this true nightmare that enveloped me like a blanket of black. I wished I could just brush it off and forget it all so easily, but it was hard to ignore the real world when it was staring at me in the face. I absolutely despised it, but I had to agree with Celeste's solemn words of truth. There was the undeniable fact that we were all trapped here, with no exit, no hope, other than the option to murder. I felt despair quickly eating any remains of my optimism up, starving to devour even more parts of my mind.

"N-No way out...We're t-trapped here," Toko clutched her head in her hands, shaking so intensely, I was worried she might collapse from shock. "What are w-we supposed to d-do?"

Byakuya let out haughty laugh, which sounded more like a scoff of intolerance than a sound of joy. "It's very simple. If you want to leave, you just have to kill-"

"Don't joke about that!" snapped Makoto, the weight of the entire situation clearly getting to him. "I-It's not going to happen, no matter how badly we want to get out of here!"

"Ugh, there's gotta be _something_ we can do!" yelled Leon out of pure distress. 

"Adapt." Celeste uttered serenely with a hint of a smile etched across her face. "Adapt to living our lives here from now on."

"Live here?" Chihiro said, visible tears beginning to well in her wide eyes. "Are you saying we should just accept it?"

"Survival is not based on who is strongest or smartest, but rather, who can adapt." Celeste explained, staring everybody down with a pointed glare of sorts. I felt goosebumps chase up and down on my arms once again, and I rubbed them harshly to force any signs of terror I had away. "And keeping that in mind, I have a suggestion to make."

"Huh? What do you mean?" Mondo demanded, his patience wearing down with each exchange of words. Celeste showed no signs of intimidation and merely laughed politely into her hand.

"We all understand that we are trapped here. Which means we will have to spend the night." She began, her voice dropping an octave to match her explanation. "You all remember the rule regarding nighttime, right?"

My mind dug into the far back of my memories to retrieve my recall of the second rule. Nighttime, I remembered, was considered from 10 p.m to 7 a.m inside the school. Certain areas would be closed during that window of time, and sleeping anywhere other than the dorms would end in punishment. 

"So, regarding this "nighttime", I think we need to add a rule of our own," Celeste resumed, yanking me back all the way into the present. I blinked twice, trying desperately to keep up with her words that ran like a stream.

"What do you mean?" I questioned her proposal, tilted my head to the side in consideration. Celeste simply giggled at my perplexity, as if she knew something painfully obvious that I did not.

"What I mean is, going out at nighttime should be prohibited altogether." She smiled with ease, folding her hands beneath her chin as she gazed brightly at us with her suggestion.

"Huh?" came Sayaka's voice, full of confusion and uncertainty. 

"The school regulations do not actually tell us not to go out at night. I would like to make it official." elaborated Celeste, a smile still stretched on her tightly sealed lips.

"B-But why...?" Toko's voice was suddenly lost in her throat as she managed to force out her concern into words, gazing wide eyed back at Celeste. 

"Think about it," the woman in question replied, dropping her hands to rest at her sides for now. "Every time night comes, we will be worried and anxious that someone may try to kill us in our sleep."

"What?" Aoi gasped, flinching the tiniest bit away from her out of raw trepidation.

"However, unlike the other school rules, we cannot enforce this. We all have to agree to follow it." said Celeste, folding her hands on top of one another against her dark, lacy dress. 

"I see what you mean," Makoto responded. "But...I think I can agree to that. Like she said, without something to restrict our movement at night, we're gonna self-destruct from anxiety."

"I agree!" Kiyotaka exclaimed, his voice far louder and confident than Makoto's. "On behalf of all the men here, I agree to comply!"

"Hey, you can't just-" Leon began, but was immediately cut off by Celeste resuming to speak.

"So everyone is in agreement?" She nodded without pausing for a rebuttal. "Good. Then, if you'll excuse me..."

"Huh?" Chihiro said. "Wait, where are you going?"

"It is almost nighttime, is it not?" Celeste replied, standing up from her seated position. With a half bow, she left us with the words, "I will be heading to my room. Goodnight, everyone."

Before anyone could stop her from doing so, Celeste departed the dining hall to where I assume to be her dorm, letting the doors behind her gently slide close. She was so calm, so rational, so natural, that no one dared to speak a word of refusal to her. 

"Looks like one person already left," I pointed out, feeling as if I said too little in the entire conversation. "What's next?"

Kiyotaka appeared deep in conflicting thought, contemplating the options given. "Well then, I guess we can call an end to today's meeting. Tomorrow morning, we can reconvene and work again with more energy!"

"Do we really have to stay the night here?" asked Chihiro, her frame quivering with outright fear of the unknown. I had to agree with her: I absolutely did not want to sleep in a haunting school like this, especially after discovering that bloody room from earlier. I shivered at the mere thought of it and decided to set it behind me for now. I couldn't plague my mind with paranoid things such as that. For now, I needed to focus on what's happening presently.

"We really don't have a choice," admitted Makoto, shrugging with a hefty sigh. "We can't go long without sleep."

"W-Well then, what do we d-do tomorrow?" Toko spoke the exact same thoughts weighting down on my mind.

"Our only option is to split up and look around again," Sakura said, taking a deep inhale through her nose. "For now, searching for clues may be our first priority."

"Yeah, okay," Aoi agreed almost instantly, leisurely nodding her head as she comprehended all that has happened. "Let's do that!"

"For now, we should get some rest," said Kyoko, beginning to stir from her position. "We need it for tomorrow."

As if she were our official dismisser, everyone unhurriedly began to arise from their seats, reluctant to spend the night alone. Then, one by one, little by little, the Ultimate students of Hope's Peak succumbed to their fatigue and exited the dining hall, making their way back to their private rooms. I, too, began to stand and stretch my stiff muscles, letting a soundless yawn slip from my lips. 

I watched as Makoto and Sayaka headed out of the room, conversing in hushed tones, as I finally came to the realization that I was completely stranded.

Locked in a place that was supposed to be my school, I was imprisoned in a building overflowing with unavoidable misery. No matter which route I took, how hard I pinched myself, I could not seem to wake up from this defeaning nightmare that soon transformed into my reality. I could not scrounge any hope now, as it was all sucked clean from my sore body with each and ever new terror that trailed me wherever I went. The only things left for me to defeatedly grasp onto here in this hellish school were insanity and despair. 

I had two choices in front of me: kill or be killed.

As I securely made sure my dorm room was locked behind me for the nth time, I thought to myself, that I would rather die a hundred deaths than to cause one on my own. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> shoutout to those who've played trigger happy panic


	3. Chapter Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Killing two birds with one stone.

They say, time flies while you're having fun, but no one ever tells you that it passes by just as quick during moments of trepidation.

I could hardly believe my eyes when the next two days progressed without any warning. It was if they had never occurred, slipping so swiftly from my grasp, that I could barely even remember what transpired during those two full days of distress. I scarcely recalled my memories of the second day: we spent our hours searching the school, and searching some more.

But despite our desperate attempts at scavenging the slightest shreds of a clue, we were only limited to the first floor of the building, and therefore, we could only do so much.

By the third day, bit by bit, everyone slowly became more adjusted to our horrifyingly abnormal school life. It was just as Celeste said; we had adapted, some more than others, but nonetheless, we had all became more accustomed to our new life.

It was like we had all wordlessly accepted our fate rotting in here, and simply went along for the ride, holding tightly onto our seatbelts in anticipation of another tragic event.

However, as seconds ticked wastefully away and we moved along for our day, there were no such mentions of any murder, or even the mastermind's puppet, Monokuma. 

I wouldn't say I'd forgotten about all of that, but it certainly treaded towards to back of my thoughts for the time being. Monokuma did not appear again after the first day, and while a part of me felt relieved at his absence, the other half feared for what he might have in mind next.

Alas, we were all still his pawns in his chess game of life or death, and he could do whatever he wanted to intimidate and force us. All we could do was helplessly play our part in this killing school life.

The only thing we could forlornly advance on was our relationship with one another. During our uneventful yet tense stay here at Hope's Peak Academy, we had all made the agreement to meet up each morning for a breakfast meeting, where we would converse and eat as a class. It was simple, yes, but effective regardless in improving our bonds. I complied without argument.

And so began our cycling pattern of lazily rising up, eating at the hall, dejectedly investigating the same areas over and over, before collapsing on our beds with pure exasperation at our fruitless searches.

It became a painful routine for each student locked in, including myself, that had somehow already etched itself into our brains and reminded us again and again of the lack of hope we had. 

This is what I thought of as I wretchedly awoken from my restless state of unconsciousness, snapping the border between dreams and reality in half as I sat up in my bed. With a sluggish excuse of a yawn, I suddenly became more aware of the piling fatigue weighing down my sore body.

I tried to remember the last time I felt this exhausted, but failed as a result. I was forced to admit that this whole stressing situation had indeed taken a toll on my health, physical or mental, I did not know. With my luck, both had already begun to deteriorate with the extending time I spent imprisoned in this school.

With stiff, aching shoulders, I propped myself into a standing position beside my bed. My legs were still shaky with sleep, and my mind was clouded and fuzzed with drowsiness. I stretched my arms high above my head, letting my scrunched spine to erect, before releasing my pent up lethargy with a sigh. I rolled my shoulder blades back, extended my forearms on both sides in a stretch, and began to prepare for yet another day of school.

I attempted to compress all of the wrinkles embellishing my white dress shirt with multiple swipes of my palms, but they were proved untamable. With each fold of ivory fabric smushed down, many more creases appeared immediately in its place. With a groan of deplorable defeat, I gave up and eventually decided to just pull my black cardigan over the crumpled dress shirt without complaint. 

After I finally completed my mission of forcefully shoving the sweater over my rumpled shirt, I hiked up the doubled layered sleeves up to each elbow to expose my forearms. I then swiftly fastened my bleached tie around my neck with great expertise, and folded the red, clip-on bow on the right side of my chest. 

Ensuring that my top half was ultimately unblemished with a quick glance into the large, beside mirror, I saw that the bowtie appeared to be a bit asymmetrical compared with the rest of the outfit. With a slight frown written across my tense face, I unclipped it without much hesitation, and replaced it right over where my heart laid. I could feel my rapid heartbeat slamming vigorously against the chambers of my chest as I straightened the ribbon into a flawless position.

After finalizing the upper portion of my outfit with a few quick brushes to the sweatshirt, I pulled my red pleated miniskirt to fit my hips. Smoothening any lingering furrows in the fine fabric, I dusted off my fingers against the soft garment. Then, lastly, I stepped inside my jet black, platform boots, cautious not to trip over the tall heels. 

The final touch was to comb and tie up my long, thick hair, that tumbled down almost to my knees. Although, quite unfortunately, I lacked a hairbrush, and was forced to make do without one. I exasperatedly figured I would have to uncover my own if I didn't want my hair to become matted by the end of this killing school semester.

I slipped the same two rubber bands that I'd been wearing for days trapped here at Hope's Peak, off of my wrists, and eyed the identical salmon red marks that were left behind. I rubbed my stiffened joints, striving to rid of the harsh, angry red engravings left on my skin, but no such luck. A few failed attempts was enough to dispirit me, and when I eventually fastened my bleached strawberry-blonde hair into voluminous twin pigtails, I was not in the best mood for the day.

I reached for the remaining two hair clips lying on the desk adjacent to my bed to slide them into place; the bunny embroidered brooch was deliberately placed on the right, and the red and white bow was carefully attached to the left. With the endmost satisfaction that my outfit was complete at last, I decided it would now be time to head to the dining hall with the others.

When I slipped out of my dorm and closed the room noiselessly behind me, I saw that there was no one else other than me dwelling in the halls. I figured either I was extremely early, or extremely late to our breakfast meet up in the morning, as I could not see any other person making their way to the dining hall.

My train of thought leaned a bit more on the latter as I recalled how long it took me to dress for the day. With a sigh of disappointment yet non surprise, I began to pick up my pace as I treaded down the hallway.

The dining hall was only a short walk from the dormitory, perhaps even within two hundred feet. I jogged out from the dim, red halls of the dorms to the vast, empty corridor where the dining hall laid.

I would soon become so accustomed to these routines, I could walk from my room all the way to my usual seat in the cafeteria. But the vibrant blue sign with a knife and fork printed on it did seem to aid me a little, regardless of my familiarity of the place.

I shouldered my way into the room, ducking my head from an invisible branch lying overhead. When I finally stepped foot inside the dining hall, I saw with anticipation that everybody else had already took their respectable seats at the long, marble table.

Other from Toko and Byakuya, who preferred to keep to themselves at a nearby table for two, the remaining classmates were all waiting for my arrival, their eyes darting at me as if I were a target for their guns.

"Junko! I demand an explanation as to why you're late yet again today!" The exchange of morning greetings between Kiyotaka and I usually consisted of him lecturing me about my tardiness, and me offering an awkward, quiet apology that never seemed to be processed. Today was unquestionably no exception.

"Oh, uh, sorry," I blankly responded, hurrying to my seat before he could open his mouth again. "I had to get dressed."

Sakura voicelessly gave a nod of affirmation from her end of the table. "That is certainly plausible for the Ultimate Fashionista, it seems." 

Kiyotaka appeared to consider this for a moment, as if I didn't provide the same elaboration the previous two days. He silently acknowledged my defense with a swift, singular nod of his head before crossing his arms firmly across his chest. 

"Okay, looks like everyone's here." He began, his voice bold and crystal clear, blaring undoubted authority. "So then, let's begin today's "breakfast meeting"!"

"Is he gonna do this every time we're dragged here?" I heard Mondo grumble from beneath his breath. 

"I know I already mentioned this earlier, but," Kiyotaka continued without any signs of disturbance or hesitation. "In order to get out of here, it is essential that we all cooperate with each other. This is why we need to build our trust and friendship with one another, starting with this breakfast meeting! Now then, let's eat!"

It was supposed to help build our bonds with each other, but this breakfast meeting made me felt more lonely and strained than if I had just ate alone. We started eating our meals in complete quietude, with not a single word or glance spared to the classmate next door.

The atmosphere was breathlessly crushing and absolutely burning with tension as wordless seconds ticked past. The only type of noise exchanged within the entire dining hall was the clinking and clatter of silverware against ceramic as cups were set down, forks clashed, and spoons scraped. It was hopeless, trying to start a conversation without instant humiliation.

It was only a few minutes into our silent, uncomfortable class breakfast of sorts when someone brave spoke at last.

"Well anyway...did anyone happen to come up with any clues?" It was Makoto who first broke the stillness that solidified with discomfort. The words hung heavy in the air as no resemblance of a response echoed in follow.

Just as I feared, we had made little to no progress in our attempt to escape. I wanted to doubt it all and believe that at least _somebody_ here amongst these fifteen would hold a discovery, but my optimism was smashed flat by a rewarding silence.

"No? Nothing at all?" He said, his voice cracked with incredulity at our lack of answer. We all traded discouraged looks with one another, hoping to find someone who begged to differ. But each face held the same wide eyed disbelief and speechless head shakes. It was no use.

"It could be anything, a crack in the wall for escape, a hint about the mastermind, nobody has anything?" He echoed, and I could hear the hurt and exasperation weighing his words. Again, no one dared to speak up.

"You are going to die." said Celeste.

It was so calm, so easily, as if she were simply making a comment about his hair, or his outfit for the day. Nothing about her choice of tone, nor her menacing words, screamed any warning of death and peril. Almost as if she was used to the concept of despair and death, Celeste uttered those words all too casually, that it sent many people, including myself, over the edge in bewilderment.

"H-Huh...?" replied Makoto, frozen with absolute fear. 

"If you can't stop yourself from showing weakness in front of others," resumed Celeste, staring him dead in the eye, almost as if she was trying to read through an impossible, unnoticeable disguise. It even sent shivers up my own spine, and I was no where near herself. "you will die."

"Wh-What the hell? Don't joke about that!" He responded, moving to inch his seat away from where she stood. Celeste merely chuckled at his unease and smiled daintily at him, folding her hands together in her lap.

"I am not joking." She said cooly. Behind her sentences were a hint of parental patience, and the slightest bit irritability at the same time. "Adaptability is survivability. Did I not say so?"

When she got no such answer from him this time around, she finished her statement with saying, "So you'd better hurry and adapt to your new life here."

It felt as if her words were aimed right for me, like flexible arrows in a weighty sandbag. It seemed as if she was talking to me as well as Makoto, and lecturing the rest of us to either adapt, or die.

I did not like such chidings that reminded us of the depressing reality of our doomed fate. I refused to absolutely give up and spend my days knowing nothing. It was better to die while fighting than to live a life of vain.

"Yeah, sounds like the girl wants to live here. And hell, more power to her," Mondo spoke, slowly at first. But his tone intensified with ferocity as he rambled on. "But no way in hell am _I_ living here! I'm gettin' outta here, I don't give a shit!"

Celeste simply laughed quietly into her hand, a quite ironic move to be so polite. "Hmhm. Sure, feel free."

"Okay, so..." Leon said before any sort of arising conflict between the two could grow. "Nobody has any clues?"

"One thing I can tell you is who's behind all this." Aoi appeared to be scathingly angered and boiling over with rage. "Someone who's totally weird and messed up, for sure! Why else would we be trapped in here in the first place?"

"Well, sure, it could be something insightful like that." Leon shrugged, addressing her ideas. "But for right now, we need like, actual, solid clues."

"Umm," Chihiro's soft spoken, faltering voice could barely be deemed audible from her side of the table. "If you think in terms of people who are really abnormal, or bizarre, like what Aoi said," she began. "Do you think maybe the person responsible for all this could be a certain murderous fiend...?"

My attention was immediately sold as my head shot up from where it previously hung. I blinked and gawked at Chihiro, hoping my shocked behavior did not terrify her too much. "A murderous fiend...Chihiro, do you have some idea who might be behind all this?" I inquired, suddenly the most intrigued one out of all the students. She pondered my words for a brief moment before giving a small, timid nod.

"Well...maybe. I mean, I can't really be certain, but," she started. "Have you guys heard of Genocider Syo?"

That particular name was not news to my ears. I recognized the person in question instantly, as I recalled seeing them all over the national news stations. "You mean that serial killer that's been in the news and all over the internet?" I asked for confirmation.

But it was not Chihiro who corroborated my concerns, rather, it was Byakuya Togami himself.

"The monstrous villain who's murdered scores of victims in brutally bizarre fashion," he muttered, nodding along to the statements the flowed out from his lips. "The word, "bloodlust" was left at each murder scene, written in the victim's own blood. Whoever it is, he's like a ghost. He strikes without warning, and disappears without a trace. And on the Internet, they started calling him "Genocider Syo"," he shot a stare at the rest of us, as if daring someone to come up with an objection. "That about covers it, I think."

"They say he's claimed over a thousand victims..." Yasuhiro groaned with distress clearly scribbled all over his face.

"That's just an urban legend though, right?" asked Makoto, remaining disbelieving. "I mean, even ten people would be completely insane. I can't imagine a thousand..."

"Anyway, whoever Genocider Syo really is, he's obviously some kind of super crazy killer." Chihiro picked up the topic again, appearing fully immersed in her own world of thoughts. She seemed to ponder her own suggestion.

"And if he really is this "ultimate" psycho, I wouldn't be surprised if he put together something like this." said Mondo, huffing vexedly under his own breath, shaking his head from side to side. 

"But like I said, I can't be certain. I don't have any evidence or anything." Chihiro reminded him. "It's just a thought..."

"B-But if they're the killer," began Leon, visibly beginning to panic as he pieced certain parts of the puzzle together. "isn't that like a killer of a problem for us?"

Aoi cut him off before he could ramble any more about his concerns. "It's okay! Everything's gonna absolutely, positively be okay! 'Cause help's gonna be here soon, I'm sure of it!"

My train of wonder came screeching to a halt when I heard that word: help. It had been several days, and we have heard nothing from the outside, dimming my assurance immensely. I wasn't certain if any help was ever going to come, but her words shred the slightest glint of light into my heart. 

Toko looked as shocked as I was as she stepped back in small, quivering steps. "Huh? H-Help?"

Aoi's confidence cut down a bit when she began to elaborate her unusual optimism and certainty. "Well, I mean, we've been stuck in here a few days already, right? Nobody's been able to contact us, so I'm sure they're getting worried. I bet they called the police already!"

In response to her bright words, a maniac laughter sliced through the murky tension of the dining hall.

It was like the paralyzing clap of thunder before a downpour. It was a single warning of what's to come: our doomed, despairingly demise.

I could feel my heart stop inside my chest and my sweat freeze against my skin as my breath got lost into the air. It was like a fight of flight instinct, I had experienced. And at that moment, I wanted more than anything to run away.

"The police? You're relying on the police?" Monokuma jeered as soon as his psychotic laughter died down at last. It was almost like he was amused at our naive hope. "You guys, seriously. Do you understand what role the police exist to fill? All they're good for is pointing guns at those only they believe are the villain, not who the actual evils are. Plus, they're _always_ defeating the bad guys," Monokuma's spirit sank with depression at his previous words. "How boring. How sad."

"W-What the fuck are you doing here?" Mondo yelled, almost falling from his chair after he recuperated from shock. Monokuma showed no signs of disturbance, or even a mere acknowledgement as he hobbled closer to our table. The students nearest to him immediately leaned away with wide, shivery eyes, holding their breath inside their throats, feared that they would be punished for breathing next to him.

"I mean, come on!" Monokuma said, as if he was discussing a storybook rather than the officers of the law. "If you really, _really_ wanna get out of here, you don't have to rely on the cops! All you gotta do is kill!"

"Hey, come on, isn't this whole act going a bit too far?" Yasuhiro admitted with a small, awkward laugh. "Why are you so eager to have us kill each other?"

"You're _still_ going on about that?" Leon complained, shaking his head in utter disappointment.

"So, mister serial killer psycho freak bastard," Mondo growled, looking as if he were preparing for a physical fight between the bear and himself. His eyes boiled with rage as he spat his words out like poison. "what the hell do you want?"

"Mr. Serialkillerpsychofreakbastard, huh?" Monokuma echoed, his tone hinting the slightest bit of taunting. "That's a pretty interesting name! German, maybe?"

"We know who you really are!" Mondo ignored his comment about his sling of insults, attempting to corner Monokuma into a corner he could not back from. 

His plan seemed to have ultimately failed, as Monokuma began to pace away from the dining table, muttering, "Maybe if I ignore him, he'll just go away..."

"Hey!" Mondo fell right into Monokuma's trap instead, rising vigorously from his seat. "Don't ignore me, asshole! Come back here right now!"

Monokuma obeyed at once, but seemingly due to other reasons besides Mondo's threat. "Now I've got your attention! Okay, listen up, kids, because this'll be the only time I'll ever have your attention!"

"Already sleeping." mumbled Leon, faking unconsciousness. Sayaka slapped him across the face on instinct, causing him to cry out in unexpected pain. He glared at her. "The hell was that for?"

"Have you already forgotten what sleeping outside of the dorms mean?" She snapped, her tone dead serious and protective. She noiselessly mouthed the words, "punishment".

"I was just joking." Leon grumbled, sighing and rubbing the growing red mark left on his left cheek.

"Well, well, I like this one!" Monokuma exclaimed, joy spilling from his words. "A rule follower she is! Monokuma approves!"

"Shut up and get to the point, bear." Byakuya retorted from where he was listening, crossing his arms out of spite. 

"Jeez, jeez! Your generation sure is impatient," Monokuma climbed onto our table with amusing difficulty that I would never mention to his face. Scrambling to his feet in a haste, he cleared his throat professionally, as if he were about to give us a speech.

"Your life here already begun and a couple days have gone by, and nobody's killing anybody!" I felt my heart drop a hundred miles and shatter on the ground at the mere mention of murder.

I hoped to never hear about it again, yet here I was, being reminded once again that this school life was not one of sluggish, harmonious days, but rather one of paranoid, murderous fear.

"I thought all you kids were lazy and selfish, and here you are, working together." He continued, dropping his gaze to peer down at his stuffed feet drawing circles on the marble countertop. "But I'm totally bored! So, so bored!"

I gritted my teeth out of pure distaste at his inconsiderate desires. How could he see our lives as mere child's play to entertain him? Homicide seemed to mean nothing to him, just something to enliven his psychopathic delight. 

"There's nothing you can say that'll make us start killing each other," I began, my voice trembling, not out of terror, but out of raw rage. "You can provoke us all you want, but we'll never-"

"Wait, I think- yes!" He cut me off, not even showing the tiniest bit of consideration to hear what I had to say. "Ding ding ding! I figured it out!"

"F-Figured it out?" Toko stuttered silently, her eyes broad with shaky alarm.

"All the mystery ingredients are here- right people, right place." Monokuma went on to explain, but it seems as if no one could hear over the roaring rush of dread and anticipation rolled into one. "So, why hasn't anyone killed anyone yet?"

It was like a daunting question put out from the teacher to their class. Half of the students would know the answer, but only a fourth would actually bother to raise their hand. Only this time, every single person in the room knew the answer he was waiting for, and nobody move an inch to volunteer. We all sat waiting, tensed, for Monokuma to say exactly what was on our minds.

"That's what I couldn't understand. But I just realized there was one very important piece missing!" He continued gleefully, a sadistic grin hidden inside his words.

"That is?" Celeste prompted for him to resume. I felt my stomach flip around inside my body, and a churning, repulsive feeling of unease crept up on me. My chest tightened with anticipation.

"If you wanna know, I'll tell ya! It's a motive!" He exclaimed, enjoying this all too much to be humanly moral. I had played the potential dialogue over and over inside my mind, but hearing out loud, it was far more scaring than any pretend conversation. 

"A motive?" blurted out Makoto, a clear veil of incredulity and appall draped across his face.

"What motive?" demanded Kiyotaka, jabbing a finger towards the bear, who simply laughed into his paws at our wave of entangled shock.

"It's so simple!" Monokuma seemed to be having a one sided conversation with us, barely reacting to our claims for elaboration and gasps of disbelief. "I just have to give everyone a motive!"

"Motive? What the fuck are you talking about?" Mondo snarled, clenching his fingers into a brute, shaking fist. I sincerely hoped he wasn't going to attack Monokuma again, or else the punishment would end in something far more severe.

"Oh, by the way!" Monokuma completely ignored his commands, seemingly unbothered by anything and everything happening around him. "There's something I wanna show you guys!"

"Stop changing the goddamn subject and answer me, you son of a bitch!" Mondo yelled, a visible vein appearing from his forehead.

Monokuma did not oblige and proceeded without any further explanation of the so called motive. "I have a video I'd like you all to see. But, oh, don't worry! It's not some pervy "adult" video or anything."

I never knew I could hold this much hate for one person, but here I am. 

"It's a special video for each of you showing what's going on outside the school." Monokuma shoved his unneeded, irritating jokes aside to zero in on the important matter. 

"Outside the school?" I heard myself utter my exact thoughts. My mind was failing to catch up with each new information, and I almost didn't believe him. Still, the possibility of being connected to the outside world brought me back to my senses and regained a bit of faith. "What are you talking about?"  
  


Monokuma let out a single knowing giggle, which gave me no answers. "Ooh, Master's so impatient today! Why don't you just watch it and find out?"

"Watch it?" cried Hifumi. "But where?"

"Here in the school, there's a specific place you can go that has everything you need to watch the video," Monokuma described. "You all know what it is right? The AV room!"

"Good, then we can go watch the video right now." Kyoko was brief, solid, and straight to the point. It did not sound like she was eager to go, but she was certainly intrigued. I couldn't help but feel the same way; I dreaded seeing what was filmed on the video, but at the same time, I felt as if it was important. Hell, it may even be a clue on how and why we got tangled up in this situation in the first place.

"Are you excited? You're totally excited!" Monokuma cheered, misreading her stoic facial expression that said nothing of the sort. But she did not bother to waste her energy to disagree, and continued on to ask.

"But before we do anything like that, I want to ask you something." She said. Monokuma tilted his head to one side, pondering what her question may be. "Why would you do something like this?"

"Why? Well, if you must know..." Monokuma hummed casually, and my heart skipped a beat. Perhaps this was the moment where he'd reveal his motive behind trapping and forcing us to murder one another. Maybe, if he did that, we could even track down who the mastermind could be. My head spun with endless possibilities that both roused and terrified me. 

"Despair. That's all."

"H-Huh?" I could not stop the surprised remark from slipping out of my mouth. His response was so clear, yet so puzzling, I couldn't help but feel haunted by his simple answer. Just who was he?

"If you want to know more than that, I suggest you figure it out by yourselves!" Monokuma elaborated. "And you can start by watching the video in the AV room! Don't have too much fun without me, okay?"

Without any sort of warning, he hurried out of the dining hall, earning a few protests and shouts of surprise from the surrounding students, and disappeared from our sight.

"H-He's gone..." Sayaka murmured, looking bothered and uncomfortable by the previous encounter we had with the robotic bear. "And once again, he left before we could find out anything useful."

"Really?" Kyoko encountered, her face made from stone. "I think we learned something _very_ useful. His own motive for this killing school life...I wonder if it holds some sort of clue to the culprit."

"Speaking of motives," Sakura spoke in following. "Perhaps the videos he mentioned held something about that? I'm very curious to find out what it contains." 

"Well then, what are we waiting for?" Byakuya was already rising from his seat, dusting off his lap. "There's no use in wasting time."

He did not wait for the rest of us to respond before pushing his way out of the dining hall, to where I assume to be the AV room. Everybody else left remaining in the room offered glances to one another, contemplating whether we should copy Byakuya's moves.

I definitely had my doubts, and I, in no shape or form, trusted Monokuma at all. But if he said was indeed correct, and those videos did hold a clip from the world outside of the school. it may be worth watching. I was so starved of communication with the outdoors, that I would do anything to see the blue sky or feel the sunshine on my skin again. I was worried; worried about my family, worried about my friends, worried about my life. I needed to see if they were all okay. 

"We should hurry, too." said Kyoko, beginning to stand up from her chair. "These videos must hold some importance, if Monokuma wanted us to watch them so badly. Come on, let's go."

When she started to walk out of the room, several others followed her pursuit, afraid to hesitate and remain still. 

"Wait up! Don't go wandering off alone again!" shouted Kiyotaka as he chased after her at an unnecessary pace. 

"Hey! Where'd you think you're going!" Mondo departed the dining hall soon after.

"H-Hold on! Don't leave me!" Chihiro ran after the two men, desperately trying to catch up.

"I don't wanna be alone..." mumbled Leon as he left his position at the table.

"N-Neither do I!" Toko grumbled sharply when she followed the rest of the group out of the doors.

I decided it was time for me to leave as well. I pressed my hands against the ceramic tabletop and pushed my chair behind me with the backs of my knees. I freed my body from the clutch of my seat and stepped out. I gazed at the remaining students in their seats.

"Well, it's now or never, right?" I said, mustering an excuse of an assuring smile. Multiple heads nodded in agreement, and I felt relief wash over my body, knowing that I had offered some courage to at least one person. 

The rest of the students and I traveled together in a big pack as we made our way down the halls. A tense, anticipating silence made its way into our nonexistent conversations, and we trudged from one corridor to another with awkward, heavy tranquility. But as long as I was not alone, I felt comforted even in such a scary place like this. 

I felt my own curiosity and anxiety eat my insides as I found myself nearing the AV room more and more. My heart slammed against my ribcage, and I thought it was going to burst out from my chest and splatter on the cold, tile floors of the hallway. But it remained inside my own body, and I was stuck with the dread of seeing those videos approaching my sanity closer and closer. I was extremely close to having a panic attack.

Our footsteps were the only source of any kind of noise as we turned corner to corner, until we finally found ourselves face to face in front of a plain, wooden door with the pixilated design of a cassette tape etched on it. Judging from the electronical map our e-handbooks provided us with, this could only be the ever feared AV room. I forced the sour lump of fear down my throat and almost choked on my own consternation. 

With deep, heaving breaths, I creaked the door to an open.

Most everyone was already seated at the countless rows of high-end CD players, headsets secured to their ears and eyes watching with intent on the film in front of them. I could not read their expressions all too well from my position, but I had a feeling that whatever was shown on the video was not pleasing. I could only hope it wasn't a tortuous, suicide video.

"Wh-What are they doing?" Aoi whispered behind me, careful not to disrupt those already watching. I tried by best to squint and glance around the dark room, attempting to scour for answers.

"There's a box with everyone's videotapes inside," Byakuya seemed to be already finished watching his own video, and was standing near the doorway, where we stood. The look of his face was unreadable, as if he were trying to hide something from being shown. I was rather glad to see him alive afterwards, though. 

He pointed to the cardboard on the ground in front of us, split wide open for hands to reach inside. "Go ahead."

We stumbled on ahead at his command, wordlessly pushing each other aside to make room for each of us to reach our videos. I ducked my head beneath all of the commotion and sifted through the mass of shiny, vinyl DVDs to unearth the one bearing my own name. It seemed to take forever in this darkness, and by the time I finally located mine, almost everybody else were taking a seat and sliding the headphones over their heads.

There was one remaining CD player open for occupation, and I slid myself into the plush, black and blue office rolling chair. Gripping the disc tightly in my hands, I wondered if I truly wanted to watch its contents or not. The raging debate inside my head spun me into utter doubt, yet inquisitiveness at the same time. Letting a sigh slip from my lips, I figured if everyone else made the decision to watch, so shall I.

I inserted the DVD into the player with surprising ease, and I felt it click into place right away. I adjusted the heavy, black headset over my ears, getting briefly tangled in the long, matted wires of the earphones. After I finally sorted that whole thing out, the once blackened monitor screen began to run colors, and my attention span was yanked into the grasp of the video in front of me.

What I saw.

A forced, audible gasp was knocked out of my lungs, and it sounded more like a yell of unawareness than any gasp I ever made. My heart began to race at once, and my blood pounded into the drums of my ears until I could no longer hear my own rapid breathing. Beads of cold sweat broke out against my skin, and I just sat still for it to cumulate. I could not believe it, and it seems, neither could my body.

It was my family.

I couldn't possibly respond. How did Monokuma find footage of my own family?

"Are you seeing this, Junko?" My mother was the first to speak. "We're so glad that you've gotten picked to attend Hope's Peak Academy! It's like a dream come true, really! Do your best, okay?"

Hearing her voice for the first time in days soothed my pained heart, and I could feel a smile tug at my lips. I never realized how much I really missed her.

"I'm so proud of you, Junko," my father spoke next. "Remember to hone your skills and improve even more! But oh, don't push yourself too hard!"

His words of inspiration gave me the confidence to proceed without caution. Listening to him reminding me to not overwork made my mind sink rapidly in relief. 

"Hey, sis!" It was my sister, Mukuro, who went last. "I told you that you were gonna be picked for Hope's Peak, right? I knew it! Good luck, okay?"

I wanted more than anything for the video to end right there. That would've been just fine, seeing their cheerful faces and hearing their messages of love and support. A normal video of family encouragement was exactly what I needed, and I didn't need anything more or less.

I missed my family so much, that it physically pained me to see them through the screen. I desired to return home, into their arms, and escape this horrifying nightmare that I'd been forced to dream of. It seemed that Monokuma knew my exact vulnerable spots and wishes to break me down the hardest.

Their support gave me the strength to move on.

Their faces gave me motivation.

They gave me hope.

But then, I remembered Monokuma's motive.

Despair.

The monitor glitched.

And what was left in place of my nurturing home, my loving family, was a ravaged, crushed war zone of my house.

I might have screamed, but if I did, I couldn't hear it through my pure, blinding despair.

My mind was so cluttered with wonders that there was no room left to think rationally. This was true terror: raw, animalistic, berserk. It was the kind of fear that drove people over the edge into insanity, and I felt as if it was doing the same to me.

At that split moment, I realized with pure horror that my mind was already thinking of a devious murder plan. I would do anything, even the lowest of the low, to see my family safe in front of my eyes again. It was that kind of fear.

I tried my absolute hardest to push aside those terrifyingly despicable, shameful thoughts to dizzily focus on the chilling voice that broke into my ears. I instantaneously winced in pain at the sound, like it was a natural instinct of mine. I could barely make out the words as they hammered themselves into my skull, each sentence pumping more and more fright into my body, until I thought I would overdose. 

"Junko Enoshima," I hated the way he uttered my name. It was almost taunting, yet nearly serious at the same time, and I could not find an adjective to describe his tone. All I could do was sit, frozen, and listen to what he had to say about me.

"The Ultimate Fashionista. She gained immediate attention and fame for her dazzling looks and impressive modeling. She had so many supporters all across the country! But perhaps her biggest fans were not some horny, teenage boys, rather, her own dear family."

I wanted nothing more than to light Monokuma on fire, right then and there.

"But oh! What's this?" My long nails dug into the vulnerable flesh of my inner palms to suppress my sheer wrath. "It seems like...something's happened to this family's well-being!"

This was the most my nerves had ever shaken before, and I found myself blown away at how severely my body could tremble. I gripped my right wrist with my left hand, clenching it so tightly in my grasp that my blood circulation cut off around my joint. Still, I was helpless to stop the twitching.

"Oh boy, this is bad!" Monokuma's voice dipped dramatically in pretend concern, like he was narrating a movie script on TV. "What could have possibly happened to this family's well-being?"

The sickening scene of my demolished living room faded to black with words that revolted me even more. Spelled out in big, bold, orange gradient letters, was the phrase, "Look for the answer after graduation!"

The noise died in my ears.

"Wh-What is this?" My own voice rasped against the dry, hollow walls of my throat. A burning sensation began to form in my nose, warning me of the potential tears that would soon follow. Whether it was tears of absolute hatred, or tears of immobilizing fear, I wanted to scream until I passed out, or better, died, due to lack of oxygen. I would do absolutely anything to escape this overpowering feeling of despair.

I no longer had control of my own body. My limbs trembled to no end, and I almost collapsed onto the floor, if not for the office chair propping my quivering frame up. My breathing only grew more and more rapid in speed, until I couldn't even feel a breath slither its way into my lungs from my uncontrolled inhaling and exhaling.

My heart challenged my bones in a game of wrestling, and I could feel in crash around inside my chest, completely unrestrained. I was sure I would've died from utter shock and dismay right there, in that AV room.

"I have to get out." I could barely hear myself say. Any sort of sound was blocked firmly from entering my ears by an excruciating, shrill, ringing noise that stabbed tortuously through my brain. I clutched my head in between my trembling, slick hands. "I have to get out, right now!"

Before I could lose consciousness due to the limited air supply flowing into my body, my own panic was sliced cleanly into two by a piercing shriek of anguish.

I whipped my head around naturally to find the owner of the ear-splitting cry of alarm. At the very back of the rows, beside the doors, was Sayaka, her back pressed against the soundproof walls of the room. Her arms were wrapped tightly around her shaky shoulders, like she was trying to protect her body from any hazards. Her knees were pulled together as she shivered from pure terror, her wide eyes trained on the ground, never daring to gaze up.

The look on her face was one I would never forget. It was the face of someone truly, wholly traumatized, so paralyzed by fear that they could not live any longer. I hated that terrified expression on her face, because it reminded me of how much pain we were all dealt with. 

"This can't be..." she whispered, her entire body trembling with immense anxiety. She looked so petrified, so scared, that she could not utter a single, comprehensible word. "Hurry...If I don't hurry out of here..."

She even couldn't finish her haunting sentence before her legs finally gave out under unfiltered distress, and she crumpled to the floor. I instinctively stood from my seat, in such a haste, I nearly knocked my chair over in my rush. All of my personal concerns were suddenly forgotten as my worry attentioned itself on Sayaka. I was, without a doubt, worried about her. She was nowhere near a good shape, and I unconsciously felt the need to aid her.

Makoto, who sat only a few seats away from her, seemed to feel the exact same way as I, for he rose at once and said, "S-Sayaka?"

"Why...?" Sayaka appeared to be unable to hear anybody. She held a single hand to her forehead, eyes expanded with consternation and angst. "Why did this have to happen? Kill or be killed? I-I can't take anymore of this!"

"Sayaka!" Makoto exclaimed as he watched her shiver to a concerning extend. He cautiously took a single step towards her, careful and considerate about her defenseless state, and knelt down to place a hand on her shaking shoulder. "Sayaka, are you okay?"

"S-Stop it!" She shrieked, desperately scrambling to her feet at once, as if his touch were fire. "Leave me alone!"

Without any warning, she burst out the doors and fled, tripping and stumbling as she did.

"Wait! Sayaka!" Makoto shouted, breaking into a sprint as he chased after her through the wavering, open doors. I cloned his actions and felt my own two feet carry myself out of the room.

I wasn't quite clear on why I decided to follow them; they would be alright by themselves. But an inner part of me scolded and demanded I go run after the two, and provide Sayaka with even more assurance.

I couldn't let a single person fall into depression: it pained me all too much to see the hope dimming from their once bright eyes. I utterly despised the feeling of hopelessness, because it alone could cost so many lives and so much joy from the world. In a place such as Hope's Peak Academy, it was important more than anything else that we don't lose either.

I couldn't let anybody give into despair.

The sound of six feet slapping against the cold, tiled floors, quickly died as Sayaka staggered, losing her balance briefly in her moment of panic filled agony. Seeing this as an opportunity to catch her, Makoto grabbed onto her arm, halting her in her tracks. It gave me the time to catch up with them, and by that time, I could see her struggling in his grip.

She fought back with great vigor, incoherent screams of protests tearing from her throat. "No! Let go!"

"Sayaka! Calm down and stop!" I grabbed a hold onto her shoulders, helping to stabilize herself. It was a difficult task, even for the two of us, since she wrestled so strenuously in our hands. It was an immense struggle between three people, and quite a lengthy one too, because eventually, her energy deteriorated and she was left shaking with exhaustion and panic.

"H-How can I calm down? Do you expect me to be calm in a place like this?" She yelled, a thundercloud of rage darkening her once cheerful face. Her words were charged with spite and hysteria. "What am I supposed to do?"

"You have to have hope!" My response was a frantic shout, desperately trying to get her to listen to my words. I needed her to relax, even if she felt so much despair. I held onto her shoulders. "That's the only thing we can do for now. If we have hope, we'll have attempts. If we have attempts, we might find a way out!"

"B-But what if there are no ways out?" She uttered, her breathing shallow and brisk as a million different thoughts raced through her head.

"I-If that happens," Makoto held onto both of her hands. "Then I'll get you out of here myself! No matter what it takes, I'll protect you, I promise!"

At his distinct, sanguine words, she immediately stopped resisting. I let go of her shoulders, giving her some room to breathe and think clearly. I could see the tears welling in her pale, frightened blue eyes, and she collapsed without a sound onto his chest.

"Why...?" Her voice was barely even audible, full of terror. "Why is this happening to me? I-I'm going to die. We're all going to die!"

"No one's going to die! I swear on that." I guaranteed, trying my hardest to reassure her spirits. "We just have to work together. There's no way one of us can betray another!"

"S-She's right," agreed Makoto, wrapping his arms protectively over Sayaka. "I'll help you get out. No matter what, even if I have to convince the mastermind himself! I can't let anything happen to you."

"Do you...do you mean that?" She whispered, and I almost failed to catch what was said.

"Of course! I'll always be by your side." He affirmed, helping her to stand on both feet. I aided in stabilizing her balance by gently holding onto her arm, making sure she didn't topple over from the weight of her immense stress. Still gripping my arm, she slowly raised her head, uncertain and utterly afraid. When she peered deep into his eyes, I saw that she was crying.

"Thank you, Makoto," she began softly, her voice quivering and shaking with stuttering words and choppy sentences. "Hearing you say that, I-I feel like I can keep going. I can get through this...as long as you're here with me."

I smiled. It was reassuring to know that some sort of strong bond existed between two people here. Everybody was so distrusting and wary of one another, constantly falling into domestic conflict.

But seeing a pair so honest and trustworthy of one another, it made me want to believe in the others just as much.

I guess this moment could've been called beautiful, if not for Monokuma appearing beside us down the halls.

"It's standing up!" He exclaimed, sounding like a middle school boy cracking a sexual joke he didn't quite know the meaning of. I fought the urge to scream as his intrusive voice suddenly cut through the deep, devoted moment a few seconds past.

"What the hell?" I heard myself cry out in surprise, flinching at once. I separated myself from Monokuma as much as possible without leaving Sayaka or Makoto's side. "Wh-What are you doing here?"

He did not answer my bewildered, frightened question, and instead repeated the last sequence of words. "Ooooh, it's standing up!" He panted, far too exaggerated for a situation like this.

" _What's_ standing up?" Makoto was clearly frustrated by the disturbance caused by Monokuma as he forced his demands from his mouth, exasperated and cross. 

"Do you even have to ask?" Monokuma complained, as if he were taunting his ferocious puzzlement. "Your flagpole, duh!"

"Get the hell out of here!" He snapped in response, and I could see the sheer anger beginning to bubble inside of his consciousness. I was impressed as to how he hasn't cussed the bear out already. "God, you're so annoying!"

"Aw, I'm annoying?" Monokuma's spirits sank faster than any ship could as his head hung to gaze at the ground in an exaggerated gloom. "That hurt, y'know..."

"Good, I hope it stung." spat Makoto, completely out of his original character, to the extent where even Sayaka appeared intimidated by his unexpected wrath. "Now leave us alone, you jerk!"

"No, no, I want to join in on the action!" I was _this_ close to attacking Monokuma as well, but I knew better not to let my irritation get the better of me. I was forced to grit my teeth until a vein popped from my head as I watched the quarrel between the two. 

"G-Go away!" Sayaka shouted, sliding her body to be protected behind Makoto's frame, her back facing towards me. I could see that her shoulders were still shaking, flinching in a tremor that spread throughout her entire body.

Monokuma tilted his head slightly to one side, looking quite amused at the mixture of our vexation and terror. He was psychotic, really, to feed off of other's fear and find humor in it as well. I dug my nails into my palms so intensely, I pierced through the delicate skin and drew bright, crimson blood.

"Hey, Makoto, you willing to share your girl with me?" Monokuma joked, obviously trying to taunt and provoke him into physical rage. I cringed at once at his poor, dirty joke.

It seemed to do just the trick, and Makoto fell into the exact trap Monokuma had laid out for him. I watched as his fingers closed into a trembly fist, sending waves of quivering, infuriated nerves up his right arm. His breathing was barely audible, becoming only hardly perceptible on each shallow, rapid exhale. 

I winced as I dreadfully waiting for the impact, even though I was behind his hitting range.

But just as it seemed he was going to hit Monokuma, his fist slowly uncurled from itself, shakily, like it was a great effort to do so. One last breath of air escaped from his lungs, quivering as it forced its way from his lips. He turned his head around to face Sayaka, an unforgettable look of shame and horror at what he had almost done. 

"I-I'm sorry." He apologized, like he was trying to forgive himself as well. Sayaka gave him a reassuring smile.

"It happens to the best of us." She said, and he blushed red.

Monokuma, in response to their conversation, simply turned his back at us with a deep, disappointed sigh. He shook his head, "If you didn't stop yourself, you would have just violated school regulations. But boy, do you need to control your anger! Someday, it'll get you into some real trouble!"

Without waiting for a reply, or even a noise in answer, he waddled away, further down into the hall, and out of our line of sight.

"That stuffed freak," I muttered below my breath, crossing my arms. "He's just trying to mess with us. Those videos, his sickening jokes, it has to be to mess with our minds."

Sayaka looked uncertain, shifting her weight uncomfortably on her two feet as she stared at the ground. "But, what if they _are_ real? The videos, I mean."

I gave it a moment of consideration before rebutting that statement as well. "If all those things really did happen, then why was nobody talking about it on the news? Surely, it would cause an uproar in the media, right?"

She had no answer for that and merely remained quiet, and my words instead rang empty in the vast corridors of the school. It was like she was giving it her all to contemplate that possibility, as if she was trying to persuade herself into believing my opinion. She slowly nodded her head, but it wasn't all too convincing. 

"Well, I guess we have to find that out after we find a way out of here," Makoto said, his eyes flitting from one end of the hallway to the other. I could tell he was purely shaken up from what he had saw in his video, as he swallowed a breath lodged in his throat that could've carried out his secrets. "Should we go back to the AV room, then?"

Sayaka shuddered immediately at his suggestion. "I-I'd rather not, for now." She whispered, a raw rasp of trauma hidden behind her hoarse words. 

"I can take her back to her room," I offered. "You can go inform everyone about that so we're all caught up."

Makoto gave some thought into my proposal, and after a brief moment in silence, he nodded and shrugged. "Sure, go ahead."

I gave Sayaka what I hoped to be somewhat of a comforting smile, "Come on, let's go."

She had an unreadable expression on her face, and I did not know if she was terrified, or terrifying. The light in her eyes were now severed by fear, and she looked utterly fatigued from the earlier events. She and I both knew she needed rest; she nodded solemnly and began to trail after me as I began to walk down the hall.

After we had left Makoto, an awkward, crushing silence was placed between the two of us. We did not speak a word to each other as we weaved our way through the long, icy hallways, and the only sounds that came from us were the soft sighs of breathing, and the noisy clunk of our footsteps slapping against tile floors.

I tried to muster the strength to talk to her, or at the very least, look at her, but my attempts were all fruitless as I simply lacked the mere courage to do so. I instead bit my tongue in place to prevent myself from saying anything insensitive. We treaded beside one another, wordless, and crept down the hall to find the dorm rooms. 

I wished I had at least tried a conversation with Sayaka to keep my mind off of the video. I continuously pushed away thoughts concerning the heavy, trauma inducing film I was forced to watch a few minutes prior, but somehow, they all found a way to slink back into my mind. I wanted to not believe a single thing that was shown, but deep down, a tight, sour knot of reality formed inside my chest, feeding and growing off of my panic.

If it was indeed real, I would never forgive myself for letting it happen so easily.

Still, no matter how much I wanted to escape this prison and search for my family, I would never spurt someone else's blood on my own hands. I swore to myself that I would never let Monokuma have that satisfaction, knowing I had fallen into despair. 

Our feet continued to carry us from one corner to the next, until we had finally found ourselves in the dorm halls. At that moment, Sayaka was still silent, her eyes narrowed at the ground, like she was concentrating or thinking hard. My steps faltered and I paused to glance worryingly back at her.

"You okay, Sayaka?" I asked as we stood in front of her dorm room. She flinched instantaneously at the sudden break in our silence, and her eyes broadened as she stared at me.

"Y-Yeah, I'm alright." Her voice was unconvincing, so she forced a polite smile at me. "Don't worry about me, you can go into your room."

"Whatever makes you comfortable," I shrugged and grinned. "If you ever need anything, I'm here."

It took a moment for her to respond, and when she did, she had a faint trace of a smile on her face. "Thank you, Junko."

I gave her a reassuring nod, or at least I hope it was, and she disappeared behind her door.

With a sigh full of unknown emotion, I left her be inside her room and began to make my way towards my own, which sat right across the hall. A few doors down, was my dorm room, and I unlocked it with ease using my assigned dorm key. Once a click surfaced, I used my hand to against the door handle and swung it open. 

It was still daytime, but after all that had happened, I felt a sudden, uneasy fatigue drape itself over my shoulders. With a weighty sense of defeat, I realized that the only way I could escape from my torturous, deranged thoughts about the video, was through sleep.

I hadn't a clue about what the others were doing at this moment, but I figured it was not much, for we had little things to discover inside this school. If I had just taken a quick nap in my room for a bit, I wouldn't miss much, I presumed. 

I closed the door behind me and made sure it was securely locked. I didn't want to doubt any of my friends, but at the same time, I didn't want to take that risk. If I was going to be alone, I made sure the only person who could get inside was myself. 

I stood still in the middle of my empty room, bathing in loneliness as I let a deep sigh escape from my lungs. I was tired: tired of this school life, tired of Monokuma, tired of myself. If sleep was my only gateway to escape, I might as well take it.

Speaking of Monokuma, his sudden appearance from earlier spontaneously came into mind. I wondered just how he got there, and knew where we were in such a short span of time. Not to even mention the fact the only reason as to why he came to us was to taunt us. I could not put my hate into words.

Instead, I glared right into the security camera that hung from the ceiling of my room, near the bathroom. Every dorm bore a camera like this, all feeding into Monokuma's monitoring system of the entire school. My room was no exception, and without a doubt, Monokuma was laughing his ass off at my distress behind a computer. 

He forbade us to break any cameras as well, so I had no choice but to feel paranoid as he watched our every move. 

After a brief moment of trying to scream my anger out through my narrowed eyes at the camera lens, I eventually gave up and decided it wasn't worth giving him that pleasure. Rather, I ambled to the bathroom door on the right side of my room, and scanned the long, large piece of paper taped onto it.

It was a note. It had been there for the past three days, but I never gave much attention to it, as I thought it held little importance. But now, I figured it would be a good time to actually read what was written.

"Announcement from Headmaster Monokuma," I mumbled as I read, my eyes skimming the words quickly. "Each room's lock has been designed to completely protect against tampering or lock-picking. Your room comes furnished with a shower, but please note that the water is turned off at nighttime."

"Huh," I heard myself say. "Why?"

My rhetorical question echoed in the still, dead air of my dorm room, and not a single sound decided to answer it. I decided to continue reading.

"Also, the bathrooms in the girls' rooms include a lock of their own."

Another odd remark. Why would the girls' bathrooms obtain a lock, but not the boys? I didn't have much to argue or complain, just thoughts of ponder, for I was rather glad to hear my own bathroom could be locked.

"Finally, we've prepared a small gift for each of you," My voice audibly raised an octave at the unexpected offer of a present. How was it I had spent multiple days here already, and was unknown to a gift lying inside my very own room?

I did not use much of the room, other than for sleeping, so I assumed the present laid in an area I had not explored in depth yet. I resumed to skimming the lines, curious about what Monokuma had to offer us.

"For the girls, a sewing kit. And for the boys, a toolkit." My spirit lifted itself at the sound of that. I was quite experienced with sewing, due to my Ultimate talent of a fashionista. It was relieving to hear I could repair my clothes if necessary. 

However, Monokuma had differing opinions.

"The sewing kit includes a map of the body's vital organs. One stab will do the job, girls!"

There was more written at the bottom of the page, but I was so repulsed and sickened by his suggestion, I immediately ripped the paper off of the door's face and crumpled it in my fists. I was no baseball star, but I managed to hurl the wad all the way into the trash can, where it flawlessly dropped inside with a the soft sound of paper hitting metal.

I no longer felt excited at the gift offer. If his intention was to have us use these as weapons, I would do everything in my power to refuse it. Monokuma truly disgusted me.

I walked over and sat down at the edge of my bed, feeling utterly exhausted from everything happening around me. The world, _my_ world, was revolving so fast, I could do nothing except to dizzyingly follow its steps. It tired me to no end, and I severely hoped to one day break free from this nightmare.

I shook off my platform boots, and they fell against the blue tiled floors with a loud clunk. I did not bother to straighten them, as I was far too weary to do any more. Same goes for my clothes; I used no energy to take them off for my sleep. Instead, I adjusted my body so I would be laying on the mattress, and cushioned my head gently onto the pillow. 

My dreams were full of bloody worries and heaving concerns.

*

"Good morning, everyone! It is now 7 a.m. and nighttime is officially over! Time to rise and shine! Get ready to greet another beautiful day!"

I wished the first thing I'd hear each morning was anything but Monokuma's obnoxious, insufferable voice, but nonetheless, it woke me up.

I straightened my back, realizing with great irritancy that I had slept on my neck, and sat on my bed, drugged with drowsiness. I gave myself a good minute or two just to stay there, blinking unconsciousness from my heavy eyes as my mind slowly pieced itself back together. 

As much as I desired to sit there forever, basking in my somnolence, I knew I must get up and eat breakfast with everyone else, just as I promised. With reluctance, I stepped out from the cozy warmth of my bed and my bare legs were immediately hit with the icy chill of the air. I shivered as I laced my boots on my feet, and rubbed my arms up and down when I stood up.

"7 a.m. already, huh," I muttered, shielding my vulnerable, sleepy eyes as I glanced at the clock hanging in my room. "I slept for that long...?"

There was no need for me to change, as I had fallen asleep the day before in my clothes. Although, when I spared a look at myself in the full body mirror to the side, I grimaced and shook my head at all of the wrinkles my lengthy nap had produced on the fabric, instant regret washing over me. It would take a brawny ironing session to smooth these down. 

With a sigh, I tried to flatten my clothes down with my bare hands, but no such luck. I tried the same with my unruly, tangled hair, matter from my sleep, but the locks simply would not listen. I spent a good ten minutes combing down my hair with my fingers, and during that time, I could've easily gotten dressed and left my room already.

After I finally decided I looked somewhat presentable, I quietly left my room, shutting the door behind me. I dug into the pockets of my black cardigan and fished out my dorm keys, which had unfortunately slept on top of as well, and left a bruise on my side. I locked up the room in one, swift twist, and slipped the set back into my pocket.

Again, I was alone in the halls as I found my way to the dining area. The atmosphere was silent and still, which would be comforting if not for the uneasy feeling of trepidation gnawing at my stomach. It seemed as if the whole world was holding its breath, waiting for us to uncover a secret never meant to be told.

My footsteps were loud and clear, but wavering and uncertain at the same time. They nervously cut through the air as my body shuddered from the abnormal chill of the air. My arms momentarily left my elbows as I yawned into my hand, a heave releasing from my tight chest.

When I entered the dining hall, I found again that everybody was already there, awaiting my arrival. Their eyes were irregularly wide with anticipation as I found my usual seat. I frowned at the sight of everyone being so frozen, so soundless, so concerned.

Not a single noise was made, not even the soft breathing of my classmates. Several of them began to repeatedly glance at the doorway, like they were expecting someone else to burst through the doors. 

I folded my arms on the table. "What's going on here? You all look so worried."

"Hey, Junko, have you seen Sayaka?" From beside me, Mondo questioned. My brow creased as I reach to the back of my memories. I couldn't recall much, because I had fallen asleep for so long. I shook my head in answer. 

"Um, I don't think so," my voice faltered as I examined each face bearing pure anxiety. Sure enough, Sayaka's face was not one of them. "I just came straight from my room to here."

"Did she forget about our breakfast promise...?" pondered Hifumi from his end of the table. I felt my heart begin to ram against my ribcage, forcing my bones to shiver and shake.

"I got the sense she always has her stuff together," Kyoko added, deep concern written on her face as she went through the options. "It's unlike her to not come so suddenly."

Everybody exchanged troubled looks and whispers of distress. My mind began to race in circles, and my blood felt like ice running through my veins. I felt fright seep into my skin. What could've possibly happened to Sayaka to cause her absence? 

There were an abundance of possibilities that filtered into my head at once, but horrifyingly, the most dominant one of them all was murder.

It seemed as if Makoto and I shared the same thought, for he stumbled from his chair and stood at once. The look on his face was so painful, even to me, that I felt every ounce of his raw terror in my own body. It was the look of sheer horror, absolute betrayal, and surging panic.

"I-I need to go..." his voice was barely audible as he spoke. He was trembling so severely, I was afraid he would pass out. The color drained from his face and his eyes were full of emptiness. "I have to check on her!" 

Without waiting for us to respond, he fled from the dining hall in such a haste, he stumbled multiple times on his way. He dashed out into the halls, and to where I presumed to be the dorm halls.

As his maddening footsteps slowly died away, the rest of the class gave each other concerned, wretched looks, shifting uneasily in our seats. The silence was deranging, and with each second of stillness, I felt my mind drive itself closer and closer to the edge of insanity. 

My heartbeat was so rapid, so intense, I could hardly breathe. My lungs felt as if they were heavy with smoke as my inhales became sharper and my exhales became deeper. My lips whispered soundless words of prayer beneath my breath, and I kept repeating the words, "Oh my god" in my growing state of panic. 

My fingers gripped my bare knees, shakily trying to stabilize my body from collapsing, and my eyes went wide with terrible, aching anticipation.

I couldn't take it anymore.

It was too much, it was all too much. My anxiety and expectancy was killing me slowly, and I needed to find out by myself. Using my trembly arms, I pushed myself off of my seat.

"I-I'll go after him." My words flew from my mouth disorderly and alarmed, as I stepped over my chair and burst out of the dining hall doors.

I tumbled out into the halls, frantically jerking my head around in search of him. Unluckily, I found that I was alone in the corridor, and there was not another person found.

My chest was heaving to an extreme degree, and I felt a snaky sense of pure dread creep up my back. I hugged my arms close to my chest, hopelessly trying to keep them from trembling so hard. My eyes darted across the white, square shaped lobby, trying to spot a flicker of brown hair, or a thread of green fabric. 

When I paced nervously around the hall, my footsteps were noisy with trepidation, uncoordinated. I hesitated to move anywhere else, as I was certain he was around this area. I racked my pulsing, numb brain for ideas. Perhaps he went into the dorms, where Sayaka stayed. 

I hysterically rushed into the dim red hallways of the dorms, the soles of my feet slapping cacophonously against the cold, hard tiles. A chatter escaped from between my teeth and my heart began to pound even harder in my chest. The worst feeling of dread, one that was raw and animalistic, began to nurture inside my body, feeding off my despair. I inhaled shakily.

Legs shaking, I yelled out, "Makoto! Where are you?"

I heard my desperate, hoarse voice echo in the corridor, and nothing else returned to me. I shouted once more, "Makoto! Hello?"

In response, I got the most horrifying scream I'd ever heard in my entire life. 

Instinctively, I stumbled back, almost falling onto my back. I flinched at once, and terror began to dig its way into my veins in place of blood. I wanted to rip my heart out from my chest to force it into silence, as its extreme, vigor beat sent shivers of shock down my spine. I felt my feet carry me to where the sound originated from, growing wobblier with each step.

It was Makoto's own dorm room.

And the door was wide open.

Without any hesitation at all, I sprinted inside, nearly tripping on my own two feet. Although, as soon as I arrived inside, I immediately regretted my hastiness.

His room appeared as if a war had taken place. There were long, severe slash marks embellished all over the red walls and navy floors, like someone had used a sword to slice their surfaces. And judging from the lengthy, unsheathed golden replica sword that laid discarded on the ground, I assumed my prediction was correct.

The nearby desk table had been completely tilted over onto its side. There was flecks of gold glitter decorating the entirety of the room, coating the floor and walls with sprinkles of aurum. It was obvious a scuffle had occurred in this room, but I was too petrified to even dwell on that thought.

I felt my stomach churn inside my body, and I wanted to vomit at the atrocious sight that laid right before my eyes.

I took the tiniest step forward into the room, so slight, my footsteps were nearly inaudible. I craned my neck. "M-Makoto?" I called.

The only place left unchecked was the bathroom.

I could hardly see through the red hot film of panic that surrounded my eyes as I crept towards the already open bathroom door.

From my position, I could make out the slumped figure of Sayaka Maizono, pressed against the shower door, completely and utterly drenched in blood.

Completely and utterly dead.

I screamed.

"What the actual fuck?" I heard myself shriek in the rawest, inhumane terror. In a matter of seconds, I fell onto the ground, and I no longer had control over my own body anymore.

There was crimson everywhere I looked, and the color burned itself into my mind, making my eyes strain and bleed. I saw blood on the walls, blood everywhere. It took me quite a while to realize the excruciating strain in my lungs from screaming so hard and long. 

It was straight from a horror scene: a girl sitting against a shower wall, red splattered gruesomely all over the crime scene, with the largest, daunting kitchen knife I'd ever seen lodged in her abdomen. Her face was completely slack. Completely lifeless.

It was then I knew with pure horror that she was dead.

I couldn't even make a sound, much less a movement, from where I was sitting, right outside of the bathroom. I didn't even realize Makoto was in the same room as me until he finally spoke.

"No..." He whispered from where he stood. His eyes were trained on Sayaka's soulless body, wide, trembling. His face was ghastly pale, devoid of any life nor hope. He looked as if he was going to collapse right there on the bloodstained shower floor. "No, there's no way..."

"She's-She's..." I tried to formulate my thoughts into words, but they instead came out as incoherent stutters. "Dead? Is she dead?"

Makoto didn't move a single inch from inside the bathroom, neither did he respond to my inquires. It was as if he was trying to talk himself out of reality. "No, no, no, no, no, no, no, there's no way she's dead. There's no way she could be killed."

I swallowed the lump in my throat preventing me from uttering a word. "We-we need to tell the others," I said, finding the energy to crawl to my feet. I rose with unsteadiness, almost tipping over from the crushing, overwhelming fear I felt.

"Why would he kill her?" He did not answer me once more. "Why?"

I grabbed his arm to snap him out of trance. "Come on, we have to inform the others about this. Let's go."

He pulled away on instinct, making me wince from the vigor. "No! I have to-I have to make sure she's..." His voice died, just like Sayaka did.

"What the hell is going on here?" A fresh voice cut through the heavy air of death, causing the both of us flinch. "What happened-"

Mondo stopped dead in his tracks.

I pointed to the body.

"What the fuck-" he began to back up until his legs hit the edge of Makoto's bed frame. "No...What...How..."

I heard it. 

A single, four note ascending tune. It was cheery, bright, almost like a school bell. Where it came from, it was a mystery. My only guess was the monitor hanging inside the room that now displayed Monokuma's face.

"A body has been discovered!" announced Monokuma. "All students please make your way to the gymnasium!"

The screen cut to black once again.

I had no more words to say. I opened my mouth, then closed it immediately after. What could I really say in this situation?

"S-Sayaka?" That was the softest I'd ever heard Mondo speak.

"She's gone." I whispered, although it sounded more like a rasp. "She's really gone."

Makoto finally fell onto the ground, on his knees, staining himself in her blood. His fingers were trembling when he clutched his head in his hands, screaming until he lost his breath. 

"What was that?" I heard Aoi's voice split into the room. "Are you o...kay..."

Her words came to a slurring stop as she too discovered the body laying in the shower.

Her hands instantly flew to cover her mouth as she gasped, sucking all the air into her lungs. Her eyes widened and she took a step back, just like how Mondo did. "What...? Sayaka...?"

"She's dead." Byakuya had also made his way into the room, crossing his arms on his chest. He looked rather annoyed and cross that we did not accept the truth, as he glared at the four of us staring at her body. "Nobody could survive an injury like that."

I didn't move from my spot, not even after everyone had gathered and shrieked in shock at the murder scene. I only stood motionless, unmoving, still. My mind was far behind my body in this nightmarish race of sorts, and it seemed as if it could never catch up to reality.

I was just conversing with her the day before. How was it she was dead?

Her encouraging, sisterly smile she gifted me the first time we met. Her soft, singsongy voice fit for an idol. Her solid, strong determination to work together.

Was it really all gone?

"What's the meaning of this?" cried Yasuhiro, recoiling at the brute, bloody sight. His frame trembled immensely, most likely out of inhumane fear.

"She was murdered, it appears." Celeste folded her hands on top of one another against the front of her dress, peering inside the bathroom. "How unfortunate."

"By who? Who did this?" demanded Kiyotaka. Although his voice declared authority, it also quivered with fear of a murderer amongst us. "Who killed Miss Maizono?"

"Well, isn't it obvious?" Leon's eyes widened with realization. "It took place in Makoto's room. Makoto is covered in blood," he pointed at the boy kneeling in front of the body. "It has to be him, right?"

I felt the entire group behind me shift away from the bathroom at his suggestion, and it sickened me that I did so too. Murmurs exchanged through the air, silent gasps were heard, and I clenched the fabric of my skirt to keep my hands from shaking. 

I didn't want to believe it, but he was certainly right: our prime suspect was indeed Makoto.

The aforementioned unsteadily rose to his feet, his eyes wide with sheer disbelief and betrayal. "You think _I_ killed my best friend? What is wrong with you?"

Mondo did not listen to his words of defense. "She died in your room, dumbass! Who else could've gotten inside other than you?"

It was visible how badly Makoto was spiraling into panic. "No, you've got it all wrong! I-I just swapped rooms with Sayaka for the night, cause she was scared!"

Leon narrowed his eyes in distaste at the abnormal response. "Swapped rooms? Sounds fishy."

"I-If you are innocent," Toko spat from her position, far away from the crime scene. I had the feeling she was repulsed by what was seen. "Then w-why did Leon m-mention you had b-blood on you?"

"I fell onto the blood, and-"

"Your excuses are quite pathetic," Byakuya retorted. If looks could kill, Makoto would've been long deceased. "Falling into blood? Swapping rooms? You're just laying out every pretext from the book at this point."

"I swear, I didn't do it!" He yelled, and I could hear his voice crack from all the hurt and treachery. "Why can't you listen to what I have to say?"

"Stop arguing. Fighting isn't going to lead us anywhere." Kyoko cut through the tense, death heavy air, sparking with conflict. "You did hear Monokuma's announcement, right? He said to gather at the gym. We best make our way there."

She did not hesitate for a reply to her command, and instead turned and left the room alone.

We gave each other wordless glances before the first few students began to trickle out of the room, following Kyoko to the gymnasium. Soon, I was left deserted in the dorm room with only Sakura, Makoto, and myself to accompany me.

Sakura nodded with crossed arms. "We should get going too." She offered.

I delayed my response to glance backwards at Makoto, who's clothes were still stained with Sayaka's drying blood. His eyes were emotionless, like he was trying to suppress everything from bursting out, and his arms were trembling.

"Come on, we should catch up." I said, and my voice came out a lot more soft and shaken than I had planned.

"You're...You're right," he agreed when he finally found the strength to exit the bathroom. "Let's go."

As Sakura and I paced ahead of him, I swore I could hear him whisper, "I'm sorry, Sayaka. I failed you."

I turned my head one last time with melancholy eyes to bid a silent goodbye to her lifeless body. I couldn't believe she was actually gone. Forever.

And part of me still thinks that to this day.

As I soundlessly trudged through the cold, disturbing hallways, I thought of Sayaka Maizono. Her spirit was so kindhearted, so gentle, so warm. She seemed to always find a way to smile, even after experiencing the most trauma. She had the determination of a heroine, the strength of a warrior, and the hope of a leader. I could still hear her voice ringing in my ears in a small, light laugh.

She was an idol; not just one on stage, but one in person as well. I aspired to be as strong-willed and courageous as she was, for she must've fought her way until death. She never once gave up, not even when she laid dying. She brought forth love and comfort and joy to thousands across the globe, and now, she was dead.

I didn't even realize I had started crying until I felt the teardrops fall onto my thighs, warm, familiar, heartbreaking. Just like Sayaka.

When I had finally stopped the steady stream of fresh tears from tracing my face, I found that we had arrived at the gymnasium foyer. Using my hands, I harshly rubbed away any stray liquids from my eyes, and brushed my bangs back with the heftiest sigh in my life. I'd hate for everyone to see me crying, but there was nothing I could do to block the red puffiness that surrounded my eyes. So I instead reluctantly yanked the doors opened and stepped inside.

I found that the rest of the class was already waiting there, spread out against the gym floor, eyes darting from one student to the other. The tension of the room overflowed and groaned under its own weight, and a contagious nervous energy plagued the people it held. No one dared to speak a word, for it would break the agonizing silence.

Without a single word of acknowledgement, I found an empty spot at the front of the gym's face, close the colorful stage. I gave the privilege of cracking the uneasy tranquility to the next person who volunteered to speak, as I had no words to say and no thoughts to think.

"W-What are we even doing here at this gym?" asked Leon, searching for any clues or answers that hid themselves in the gymnasium. "Somebody just died!"

"If we don't obey Monokuma's demands," answered Kyoko, her gaze solid and stony, like a mask of steel. She was utterly calm as she spoke. "Who knows what might happen. We are his prisoners, and we can't afford to make any more sacrifices than we already have."

"Why should we listen to anything he has to say?" The blend of emotions that buried themselves in Makoto's voice was so diverse, I could not extinguish a single feeling from his tone. It was a mixture of anger, fear, spite, betrayal, hurt. So much pain was embedded in his words, each sentence stabbed right through my weakening heart. "He killed Sayaka! Monokuma killed her!"

"I would never do that!" I thought I heard somebody scream in surprise at the sudden appearance of Monokuma on the podium. He just came from nowhere, and was standing on top of the stage as if presenting a valuable speech. I immediately flinched backwards at the sight of his face, wanting anything more than to separate myself from him as much as possible. "If you can believe anything, you can believe that!"

"M-Monokuma?" cried Chihiro, bearing the same shock as I did. She slunk to the back of the crowd, attempting to hide herself amongst the students.

"He's here again!" Mondo growled, his tone voicing clear hate. 

"You know, I would never do anything that'll break the school's regulations!" Monokuma continued, leaning forward to speak to us more audibly. He cupped his paws around his wicked mouth. "Compared to other bears in the safari park, I was quite the rule follower!"

"Then who did it? Who killed her?" asked Hifumi, visibly sweating out of pure trepidation and worry.

"Come on! I thought you guys were smart!" Monokuma complained. "The one who killed Sayaka Maizono is... one of you!"

One of us?

I pulled my arms into myself as my eyes darted across the room, examining each face that surrounded me. Not a single one of them said anything like, "I am a killer": they were all high school students like myself, how can any one of them be capable of such a heinous act?

There was no way. I couldn't believe that someone had committed a crime already. Or rather, I didn't want to believe it.

Deep down inside me, I had always known the killer was among us. I just didn't want to admit it to myself.

Monokuma simply tilted his head at our wavering, choked disbelief. "Hmm? What's the matter? You all look like pigeons that have been fired at by Gatling guns!" He leaned closer, dropping his chest to hit the tops of his kneecaps. "It's simple: one of you killed Sayaka in order to graduate. That's all there is to it! It's the rules, you know."

"Y-You're lying..." Hifumi stammered. "Right?"

"There's no way one of us actually..." I swallowed through my desperate insists. "...killed Sayaka, right? None of us would do that!"

"Of course he's lying!" Makoto hissed, and I could see the anger begin to simmer inside of him. "Why? Why did you just kill her like that?" He started to yell his demands at the stuffed bear standing on top the podium, like bullets of words requesting the truth.

"Nope, sorry." Monokuma popped the "p" in his words, rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet. "One of you definitely killed her. The culprit in question should certainly be aware of that."

My voice faltered against the scratchy walls of my throat, hoarse from my previous hysteria. I did not utter a single word as I glanced around the room, observing each face once again. Each person bore the same expression: it was one brimming with fear, mistrust, betrayal, despair. Each unnerving flick of a gaze, and each anxious shift of a weight sent me tumbling into suspicion, and I doubted I could trust any of these faces any more.

After all, there was a killer among us, right?

"A-Are you serious...?" Chihiro seemed close to tears from her flattening distress.

"Someone...Someone killed someone?" Kiyotaka exclaimed, his face turning ashen and his eyes growing wide instantly. His shock mirrored mine.

As calm and collected as ever, Celeste spoke, "It is amazing what some people are capable of."

"Hey, hold on!" barked Mondo, his trembly fingers closing into an even shakier fist. "Don't just assume he's telling the truth!"

"Quiet down." Byakuya retaliated, his voice serrated and commanding, with a hint of bitterness behind it. "If one of us really did kill her, that person gets to graduate from school, right, Monokuma?"

"Huh?" Was Monokuma's only reply. I could see Byakuya's patience wearing thin as he exhaled sharply out of vexation.

"Don't play dumb. That's what you said, isn't it?" He spat. "If you kill someone, you get to leave!"

Monokuma merely giggled at the sound of his harsh, pressing words. Then, tiny sniggers transformed into fits of maniac laughter, and soon, he was urgently wheezing for breath between his howls. I gritted my teeth, so hard, I felt my own jaw creak. It took every last bit of my willpower not to send him flying to oblivion.

"W-Why are you laughing?" Leon panicked, backing away from his spot as he watched the bear dissolve into his own laughter. He looked truly and genuinely terrified, and I was forced to say the same for myself.

"Naive! You're just so naive!" Monokuma sneered with great amusement at our horror. "You think it's really that easy? You can just kill someone and waltz on outta here? I-I can't stop laughing!"

"Shut the hell up and just spit it out!" Mondo snapped, his voice a menacing, low growl, ready to pounce.

"Oh, no, no, no, the real thing has just begun," Monokuma mused. "Are you ready? Allow me to explain the second part of the rule regarding graduation!"

"Second...part?" I heard myself echo, my words a mumbling, perplexed heap. My head spun in never ending circles, and any and all new information failed to stick onto my brain. It was all happening too fast, that I couldn't even comprehend what happened twenty four hours ago.

And it seems as if Monokuma didn't gift me the time to do so either. "Just like I explained before, you must kill someone if you want to leave," he proceeded with ease, sentences flowing from his mouth smoothly. "However, even if you do that, there's still one more part to the agreement you have to uphold, remember?"

As I racked my brain for answers to recall, Celeste already beat me to it. "You are referring to rule number six of the school regulations, correct?" She answered, as if this were a geography quiz rather than a gambling game of life and death. "If you are the "blackened", you must not let anyone else find out you are the killer."

Monokuma was elated. "Ding ding! Bingo! It's not enough to just kill someone. You have to actually get away with it!"

Celeste appeared deep in ponder. She cupped her chin in her palms, "In other words, pulling off the perfect crime in such a way you cannot be caught."

"Well, what does "caught" mean?" I felt afraid to ask, but I did so anyways.

" _That_ will be determined by a simple system created by yours truly," Monokuma replied with glee lacing his sentences. "So, once a certain amount of time has passed after a murder, a class trial will begin!"

"Class...trial?" I repeated slowly, furrowing my eyebrows in thought. A strange title it bore, and I was puzzled by its sudden upbringing. I did not remember reading about such things in the e-handbook.

"Yup! It'll begin a few hours after the murder!" Monokuma went on to explain. "Everyone will gather together, including the blackened who committed the murder. And they, and all the spotless students, will engage in one big debate showdown on whodunnit!"

"We-We have to debate w-who the killer is?" Toko stuttered, her arms quivering out of pure befuddlement and fear.

"I don't see a problem with it," smirked Byakuya, like he had just won a tough battled game. "It makes it all the more interesting, don't you agree? Please continue, Monokuma."

"On your word, boss!" Monokuma was over delighted to see one of us enjoying his odious schemes. "During the trial, you'll have to present your arguments about who you think the blackened is. And once everything come to an end, the outcome will be decided by popular vote!"

I shivered instantaneously at his elaboration. Goosebumps raced all over my body. I couldn't believe such a hazardous situation would end by democracy vote.

"If you correctly identify the culprit," Monokuma resumed. "Only the one that disturbed your peace will be punished. The rest may continue their communal life. However, if you get it wrong, then the one who got away with murder will survive, and the rest of you will receive your punishment."

"So, um..." Hifumi was the first to dare to speak after the twisted, grisly explanation was over. "What exactly is this "punishment" you keep talking about?"

"Hm?" Monokuma seemed struck by such a simplistic, naive question. "Oh! Well, to put it simply, it's execution!"

I almost fell backwards for the second time that traumatizing day. My ears began to ring excruciatingly, giving me no chance to confirm what I had just heard. My mouth fell open on its own, so full of shock and bewilderment, it no longer held the strength to hold up on its own.

"E-Execution?" cried Hifumi, his face going ten tints paler than usual. 

"W-What does that mean?" asked Chihiro meekly.

Monokuma sighed dramatically before blowing into a fit of exasperation. "Execution is execution! Ex-e-cution! Zapped by an electric chair! Choking on poisonous gas! Drowning! Getting torn apart by a hurricane!" He paused to ponder that one. "Ooh, that one sounds fun."

"S-So, to make sure I understand..." Kiyotaka's face was devoid of life as his eyes broadened with raw terror. "If we get the culprit wrong, then the rest of us get executed?"

"I knew you would get it, Taka!" Monokuma giggled into his paws. "You're always so smart, you know?"

Kiyotaka looked as if he were about to faint. "How-How did you know my-"

"Anyways, these trials will be run quasi-jury style. Which means you'll be deciding who you think the killer is. But judge carefully, because all your lives are on the line!" He broke into yet another outbreak of laughter. 

"I-I would never play with my life like that," my voice came out as a surprising low growl, clawing the sides of my throat. "We're not gonna just declare who's guilty just from that!"

"Well, unless you wanna die a horrible, painful death," Monokuma added. "You best do as I say!"

"He's right," Kyoko said, her voice steady and flat, like a calm ocean's wave. "We can't do much to resist. We must do our best to investigate and discover who the killer is."

"Well, I don't think we should do much investigating," Leon muttered, ruffling his hair as a sign of high irritancy. "I mean, it's kinda obvious who the killer is, right?"

I forced my head around to look at Makoto, and it seemed as if everybody else in the gym did the same as I. Each pair of eyes stared right into his soul.

"It has to be Makoto, right?" Aoi's voice was small, quiet, unbelieving. I had to agree with her.

"I don't see why else," Byakuya deadpanned, using the tip of his middle finger to nudge his glasses higher up on his nose. "All the evidence we have points to him."

Makoto was breathing heavily out of sheer hysteria. "N-No, you guys are wrong! It's not me, I swear!" He yelled, his voice cracking from all the panic that infiltrated into his body. "I didn't do it, I-I-"

"You have blood on you." stated Celeste, nodding at the dried blood encrusting his hoodie. In immediate reply, he began to harshly rub the copper flakes off with his hands, staining his palms a deep, rusty red. "Sayaka was found dead in your room."

"Which only you could've gotten into." added Chihiro, her tone gentle and faltering, like she was uncertain of her very own words.

"Plus, you and Sayaka were, like, super close, right?" Mondo snarled. "You filthy bitch, you really did kill her, huh?"

"I didn't! This is all a lie!" He defended, his words tripping and stumbling over one another as they forced their way from his lips. "She died in my room because we swapped for the night. And-and I have blood on me 'cause I fell into it! Right, Junko?" His eyes darted and trained on me, begging and pleading for my testimony.

"He did fall into the blood." I mumbled, unsure of which side to pick. I wasn't adamant on believing Makoto was the killer, neither did I fully believe he was innocent. 

"I-I bet you're just a-accomplices!" spluttered Toko, glaring at the both of us with disgust. "Stop trying to defend a m-murderer!"

"Please," beseeched Makoto, each of his breaths tackling his chest with growing vigor. "It's not me, I swear."

"Then why don't we bring this to the class trial?" Byakuya offered, his tone a jeering hurl. "You'll have to fight for your innocence there."

"Let's go, then!" Leon said, beginning to walk towards the exit. "We already have our killer. We already have our evidence. We just need to vote, right?"

"W-Wait, hold on a second!" Makoto yelled. "If you vote for me, you're all gonna die! Don't you understand?"

"He's just obeying the rules, Mr. Naegi," Monokuma mused, and I could practically hear the sly, psychotic grin hidden in his words. "No harm in doing that."

"Rules? What rules?" This was the most out of character I'd ever seen Makoto act, for he was almost trembling with absolute hate. His tone was spiked with poison that seeped beneath my skin and chilled me to the bone. "You never told me about this "class trial" thing, or whatever! What the hell is that?"

"It's a regulation, don't you understand?" Monokuma's voice seemed to drop a few octaves as his tone died into seriousness. His wicked, red eye began to flash pure red with infuriation. "And here I thought you were smart. How disappointing."

"Well, whatever it is, I'm not doing it!" He shouted from the base of his lungs, maddened yet terrified at the same time. "This is seriously so fucked up! If I go to that class trial, I'm gonna die! We're all gonna die!"

"Huh? And why is that?" Monokuma snarled. I felt unease gnaw its way into my body, drowning my consciousness in a trepidation so strong, I felt the urge to vomit. Instead, I bit my lip until I drew blood and held it inside for as much as possible. I had the worst feeling of dread creep into my body and staining my insides black with despair.

"Everyone thinks _I'm_ the killer! When I'm not!" Makoto argued, his voice growing louder and louder in volume until it screamed of protest. He was clearly fighting for the rights of his life. "I'm not participating in your little game with my life on such a thin line! If I go, I'll die! You think I wanna die?"

"Sucks to be you, I guess!" growled Monokuma, those tiny, hooked, silver claws unsheathing themselves from his left paw. He appeared unamused by his reasonings. "But you can't just _not_ participate in the class trial! Who cares really if you'll die or not? By the way you're talking, you're a dead man anyways!"

"Fuck right off!" Makoto spat the words full of spite and revulsion right in Monokuma's face, like stinging venom. "Say whatever you want, but I'm not going!"

He pivoted one hundred eighty degrees on one heel.

And began to sprint.

"How foolish of you." Monokuma's voice was suddenly sucked dry of any lingering emotion. He hummed a single note tune that I would hear inside the rest of my nightmares. "Oh well. Goodbye, I guess."

I wanted to believe that "goodbye" meant opening the doors for him and letting him to escape.

But still as always, I was naive.

Too, too hopeful.

It was too fast.

Too fast, I barely even heard the sound of a thousand bullets cutting through the thick air.

Makoto Naegi never moved again.

I had never, ever seen a person die before, not even on TV. Although something deep within me, a feeling so primal, so animalistic, informed me that the stench that lingered in the air was indeed death. The blood, there was too much of it to even be humanely possible, was something I'd never thought I'd have the displeasure of seeing, yet here I stood in front of yet another corpse of a former friend.

The way his body fell was a clear sign he was already dead before he hit the ground. After all, nobody could've survived an injury so intense, so brutal like that. I couldn't even distinguish his face from all the blood that splattered itself onto his head, and I was forced to wretchedly wonder what emotion he felt at the split moment of death.

I felt the raw fear that lodged itself into my abdomen from the first time I arrived here finally explode, and I shrieked so intensely, I couldn't even recognize my own grief stricken voice anymore.

It took a few crushing, breathless moments of silence for the screams to collectively rouse.

"Blood..." was the only thing that came from Toko's mouth before she collapsed onto the floor in a faint.

"Wh-What the...?" Aoi gasped, falling to her knees with her hands cupping her mouth. Her eyes were trembling with unreleased tears of horror at the sight in front of her.

"I don't..." Tears fell from Chihiro's face and traced her cheeks as she hiccuped, her chest unsteadily rising and falling with each forcible breath.

"Th-This can't be real." Leon stuttered, sweat beginning to run down his forehead. He was utterly paralyzed in his spot, and only stood still as his eyes never left Makoto's body on the ground.

A distinctive screech pierced through the air, like a cry of true terror. "NO WAAAAAAAAAAAYYY!" screamed Hifumi at the top of his lungs, until he lost his breath to continue any longer.

"What the fuck did you just do?" Mondo shrieked at Monokuma, appearing more enraged than I had ever seen him act. His fists were locked into place.

Monokuma just solemnly shook his head from side to side. "I told him his anger would cause some real trouble one day," he groaned, facepalming his forehead into a paw. "Well, a well deserving punishment, if I have to say."

"Well deserved?" screamed Aoi. "He just-you killed him! How is that well deserved?"

"'Cause he was disobeying the rules!" Monokuma was infuriated at our mass of growing questions. "Speaking of which, I'm adding that to the school regulations: you must attend a class trial every time one is held."

He kept his word, because not long after, I felt a faint notification buzz against my hip. My fingers were still trembling when I reached inside my sweater pocket and fished out my own e-handbook. Sure enough, the section containing every rule had been expanded by one page in length.

"Rule 9: Each student posing an alive status is required to attend a class trial. Refusal of participation results in punishment for not volunteering in class."

"I had wanted to keep unnecessary deaths to a minimum, but I suppose an example is needed for the rest," Monokuma chirped. "Thank god I have my Gatling gun! But you understand now, right? At least I added another rule to make sure none of you follow in poor Makoto's steps!"

I felt truly sick to my stomach. How was Makoto Naegi, a living person, a friend, a mere example to display Monokuma's power? I felt such fury, such hate overtake me in that moment, that I wanted nothing else but to dismantle that bear limb by limb. Just how many more lives would he soon claim?

I could not keep my gaze off of Makoto's corpse. He laid unmoving on his stomach, utterly drenched in a sea of crimson. His body had been impaled with hundreds upon hundreds of bullets, leaving so holes in his flesh, that I couldn't even recognize his figure anymore. 

The bleeding simply would not stop, and his blood continued to spill out onto the gymnasium floors, staining the polished wood ruby red. And the overwhelming, repulsive odor that arose from the surplus puddle made me gag on my own breath. As much as I wanted to rebut it, I knew that he was, without a doubt, dead.

Was he really just alive a few breathing moments ago? Did he really stand beside me, argue with Monokuma, and desperately defend himself only seconds ago? He was living, complete, whole. He was a human.

He was my friend.

Were all those days spent together during our short lived tranquility all just to end up into a vain despair? I still remember how friendly he sounded, how peaceful he looked, how brightly he smiled when I had first introduced myself to him. Was that really the same boy who laid dead on the ground, twenty feet away?

I swallowed and almost choked on my saliva at the gruesome, bloody sight that unfolded itself in front of me.

Just yesterday, it seemed, I was in the hall with Sayaka Maizono and Makoto Naegi, comforting and encouraging one another with a hope so bright, it would lead a utopian future. Now, only one stands lone.

Over the span of twenty four hours, I had suddenly lost two friends.

I guess Monokuma really did kill two birds with one stone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i wanted to end it right before the investigation but the ending's too perfect so here you go


	4. Chapter Three

Death.

Was I so scared of it anymore?

After seeing so much of it, did it really still have an effect on me?

With horror, I slowly felt myself adapt and conform into the concept of death. It still terrified me to no end, but from the first time I saw a corpse to now, I sensed myself slowly growing more and more used to it. And I absolutely despised that part of myself with every inch of my soul.

I refused to believe I had too quickly fallen accustomed to this sickening, repulsive stage of life, but no matter how much I tried to deny it, it was inevitable: death was now an acquaintance of mine.

And it seemed this was exactly what Monokuma had in store for me. Each vile, deplorable act of killing that unfolded in front of me was merely a forceful path to guide me right into the hands of despair. 

"Why do you all look so frightened?" Monokuma tilted his head innocently to the left. "It's just death, you know. You'll get used to it."

"You killed him," I seethed through my blinding crimson world of pure fury. I felt my fists clench together out of spite as I yelled, "You killed him! Why?"

Monokuma certainly was not a patient person. "Didn't I already explain it to you all?" He snapped with great vexation, disappointed at how we refused to keep up with him. "He was resisting the rules. Not even he could escape that punishment, you know? "

"Are you really so serious about rule breakers?" interrogated Kyoko, crossing her arms and glaring dead into Monokuma's beady eyes. "Or were you just waiting for a moment to kill?"

Monokuma, in response, merely waved her off in dismissal, rejecting any more questions left lingering in the air. "That's not important. Anyway, none of that matters right now," he went on. "I have something I'd like to give you to help you in your search for the blackened!"

"Huh?" A startled noise forced its way from my throat.

In answer, Monokuma pulled out a singular, small, slim file. It was mainly black, with a dark grey stripe on the bottom and a red square on the lower left hand corner. "This little file has all the information I've gathered about the death in question. I liked to call it: the Monokuma File!"

"Mono...kuma File?" repeated Kiyotaka, a blend of perplexity and dread on his face.

"Yep! It's super duper important, okay?" Monokuma lectured. "I mean, naturally you guys aren't experts at this kind of thing, so you can only do so much with a corpse. So instead, I've gathered up everything I know about the circumstances and the cause of death."

"C-Cause of death? How do you know how she died?" Chihiro questioned from the back of the group, and I could hardly even pick up her voice.

"'Cause the surveillance camera picked up the whole thing!" Monokuma looked repulsively overjoyed to admit it, almost as if he were telling us he went to a band's concert. "I got to see it all go down! And wow, I was not expecting such a twist!"

"Wait, so then," Kyoko was quick to pick things up and as sharp as ever. "You know who killed Sayaka?"

Monokuma giggled into both of his paws. "Of course I do! If I didn't, I couldn't possibly pass a fair and accurate judgement during the trial, no could I?"

Kyoko nodded, as if she were somehow reassured by his distasteful words. "That's a good point. The judge has to be able to make the proper decision. That's...somehow comforting."

"Comforting?" echoed Mondo. "If the damn bear knows who the killer is, just tell us already!"

"He's right," said Byakuya, crossing his arms once again as he spared a single glance behind his shoulder. I didn't need to look behind me to know what he was staring at. "At the very least, can you tell us whether or not Makoto Naegi was the culprit?"

Monokuma began to laugh again, his haunting amusement ever tormenting my soul. "Nope! He was innocent! I wouldn't kill the blackened before they get discovered. That's the fun part: the Class Trial!"

I was an even greater loss at the sound of that. "He...was innocent?" I started to say. I felt my eyes widen as the true horror began to sink into my mind. "So you just killed an innocent person?"

"Dammit! Then who's the real killer?" Mondo growled behind clenched teeth. I could see the rage boil up inside of him, and I prayed with all of my might for it not to come billowing out, otherwise he would just be another corpse at Monokuma's disposal.

"That information is for me to know and for you to find out." Monokuma refuted. " _You_ have to put your full effort behind you investigation to unlock who the killer is! Now, then, good luck!"

Without another word, Monokuma disappeared behind the podium once more, leaving us in a stunned silence.

And there I stood, in the front of the gymnasium, staring blankly at the stage, as if I could bring forth answers by doing so, with the rest of my classmates in tow behind me, sharing the same bewilderment and terror. 

And behind us, laid Makoto's body, still bleeding out onto the floor. 

"He...wasn't the culprit?" Aoi's voice was stained with pure shock and dismay as she shakily pointed to the cold body on the ground. "He didn't kill Sayaka?"

"So, he was telling the truth after all," Byakuya nudged his glasses frame higher up on his nose. He let out a disappointing sigh. "If not him, who else?"

That's when it finally settled in. The true, sheer terror that somebody among us did in fact murder another, was a feeling I had never experienced in my life before. Just yesterday, I was certain nobody would gain a motive from that video. But now, I knew, that Sayaka's corpse was growing colder by the minute, lying in another dead man's room. 

And if we did not find out who killed her, we would perish instead.

Still, that idea tormented and beat my soul over and over. I could not escape the inevitable thought; either way, someone else must die at the end of the day. It doesn't matter which side wins.

"Dammit." seethed Leon, a sharp huff escaping his lungs. "I was certain he was the killer. Who the hell could it be?"

"To figure that out, we must start the investigation right away." Celeste spoke. She showed no signs of any disturbence, not even when Makoto was killed in front of our very own eyes. "We can't let the dead drag us down forever."

My head whipped around at the sound of her voice, so quickly, my own long hair lashed against my face. "How could you say th-"

"I believe I told you all before," Celeste cut me off before I could spiral into my own rage for any longer. "No matter the situation is, those who cannot adapt will be the first to die. I even warned him before this, yes?" Using a slender, pale finger, she leisurely pointed to his body, lying a few dozen feet away from us. "But he did not listen. That is why he is dead."

Aoi stood up on her feet, her weight unbalanced. "That's still a horrible thing to say!" She shouted, and I could hear her voice tremble.

"Stop arguing." said Kyoko, her tone dead serious and stern. "We need to begin our investigation soon. I have a feeling Monokuma will not wait for us to start the trial. At this point, we should split up."

"S-Split up?" Hifumi forcibly complained. "We don't have anything!"

Kyoko held up her own e-handbook. "We have the Monokuma File, right? From there, we'll have to collect clues to form a foundation, then construct an arguement to come to a final decision."

Everyone followed her exact steps, including me. I felt for my handbook inside my pocket and slid it out into my palms. Sure enough, the page count had increased, and there was now a new section for the Monokuma File. There was a single page dedicated to the file, with a potrait of Sayaka's face with a bloody 'X', and a block of text beside the photograph. A shiver snaked down my spine as I imagined just how many more would follow.

My eyes scanned the digital words displayed on the screen quickly. "The victim is Sayaka Maizono. The time of death is estimated to be around 1:30 AM. The corpse was found in Makoto Naegi's private room in the dormitory area. The victim died in the shower room. The cause of death was a stab wound in the abdomen."

"Huh? That's barely anything!" exclaimed Leon, furrowing his eyebrows in bitter disappointment. "How are we gonna find out who the killer is just from this?"

"Really? I think it's perfect." Kyoko replied curtly. "We have a time of death and cause of death. We can establish the setting, weapon, origin of the weapon, and everything in between just from that."

"There's more too!" Kiyotaka called from where he stood. "'Apart from that, she was also hit on her right wrist. The injured right wrist appears to be fractured.'"

"That seems to be more than enough information." Byakuya said, tucking his e-handbook away in his back pocket. "Now, shall we get started?"

Mondo appeared to be rather perplexed by the file. "Yeah, it goes into all these specifics and shit," he started. "But none of it really points to the killer."

"Except for where the body was found," began Chihiro, her shoulders beginning to tremble. "But..."

"Our only suspect has been eliminated from the game." Byakuya finished for her, using much harsher words than she would've. "We'll have to figure out the rest for ourselves."

Kyoko simply nodded her head to show her agreement. "We should get started, shall we? Let's split up for the investigation. We first need a person to guard the scene of the crime, to make sure no one tampers with it."

"I guess I can do that," offered Mondo halfheartedly. He looked quite defeated, as if he were dreading returning to that haunted room ever again. "I'm not too good on solving mysteries anyways, so I'll leave that to you."

"H-How do we know h-he's not the killer w-who could mess up the c-crime scene?" Toko seemed to be now recovered as she hissed her reply, clear disapproval in her voice.

"I'm not the fucking killer-"

"I'll go with him, then." Sakura's steady, calm voice cut in before Mondo and Toko could get into another arguement. "We'll be on guard duty."

Celeste nodded her head elegantly to voice her acceptance. "Very well. You two best hurry and stand guard before anyone else could mess with the evidence."

At her word, Mondo and Sakura both began to exit the gymnaisum, their pace quickening even farther as they avoided Makoto's body lying lifeless on the floor. As they left the twin doors swinging to a close behind them, the metal doors slamming cacophonously as snapped shut, leaving a deathly silence behind. It was like the sudden hush after a clap.

"Well, I see that the game has begun," Byakuya chuckled hauntingly to himself, his tone of eagerness and curiousity making my blood boil in my veins. Turning his back on us, he said, "I'll be going too."

He left without a proper goodbye.

His cold words hung in the blood-scented air, lingering for what seemed like an eternity. They sent chills racing all throughout my body; how could he just call something like this a game? It was as if this whole situation was merely a game for him to conquer, and we were just the loot. I hated how easily he played along.

"I'll start heading to the crime scene as well," Kyoko's voice was much less discourteous than Byakuya's. She turned on her heel and began to follow his steps out of the gym. "Good luck, everyone."

When our fourth classmate finally departed us for the gruesome, horrid, bloody crime scene, silence fell upon us at last. We remained in our spots, uncertain of what to do next. We hadn't a clue about solving any murder mysteries, nor the skills to properly investigate. There was so little we could do, and so much we could worry about. 

Eventually, someone found the courage to speak. "Are we gonna investigate a murder?" Aoi's face showed visible concern. Concern of what, I did not know. There were simply too many options to choose from. "I mean, we're not detectives or anything. How do we even do something like that?"

"A-Are we sure M-Monokuma's not lying about M-Makoto being innocent?" Toko mumbled, playing with the ends of her long, deep purple braids. "Wh-What if this is a trap?"

"I'm sure Monokuma wouldn't just _lie_ like that," I objected. "Why would he talk so big about the Class Trial if we was going to kill the blackened anyway?"

"W-Well, I guess it wouldn't hurt to give it a shot," Aoi admitted, shrugging sluggishly. "After all, that's the only thing we can do right now."

"That's true." concurred Hifumi, looking a bit uncomfortable and displeased by the circumstances. "We may as well at least check just to check."

"Even if I w-wanted to, I c-can't help inv-vestigate..." Toko said underneath a sigh of her own breath.

Leon crossed his arms and tilted his head, raising an eyebrow. "Wait, why not?"

She began to sweat from his inquiry. "I'm not g-good with...b-blood." 

Judging from her behavior from earlier, when she had briefly passed out from Makoto's murder, I could tell she was being wholly honest. And, I'll admit, a small part of me related well to her. The sight, the smell, the mere mention of blood sickened me. I had almost vomited at the punishment a few minutes prior. 

Leon shrugged and ruffled his hair out of irritability. "Well, whatever. I don't think anyone was expecting much from you, anyway." He let out a large, audible sigh before she could even protest. "Alright, I guess I'll get going."

Gifting us with those few words, Leon too began to push his way out of the gym. I wasn't sure if he was looking at the corpse lying in the way or not, but if he did, he showed no signs of such. Although, he did look quite green when the doors shut behind him.

"Shall we go as well?" Celeste hummed with a pleasant smile on her face. It frightened me how she was so at peace at a time like this. Whatever she was, she was certainly not human.

"I-I guess so," Kiyotaka murmured. It was the first time I had seen him without his bold fighting spirit. "Let's go."

Although he lacked his dauntless energy from earlier, he still lead the rest of the remaining students out of the gymnasium. I trailed after the crowd, hanging towards the back with my gaze trained firmly on my feet. I could see my blurred, heavily distorted reflection in each tiny rhinestone that embroided my boots.

Was this who I am? A mere, small pawn amongst many others in a larger game of chess designed by the mastermind? A hollow shell, a deformed mirror version of who I used to be? I did not know my identity anymore, as it had all been washed away by this tremendous flood.

I kept my eyes glued to the shiny, contorted gym floor, the soles of my shoes squeakily scraping the surface as I dragged myself on. The emotions swirling inside of me could not be described by words, but it included hints of rage, horror, confusion, and misery. It took me quite a bit to ultimately realize it was the feeling of despair.

As the exit grew closer and closer, so did Makoto's body on the ground. I felt bile climb inside of my throat as I finally spotted the expanding pool of blood arrive beneath my feet. I made sure I did not step inside it, for even the sight of it made me feel nauseated. The blood was still wet, still warm, as it continued to seep into the floor, staining it a forever crimson. Each time I passed through the gym, I would be wretchedly reminded of the murder of my friend.

I tried my hardest to refrain from looking at the body, but I just could not peel my eyes off of it. He was completely and certainly drenched in his own blood; not a single speck was laid unstained. His clothes were a mangled, torn mess, no longer a hoodie and pants, but now a collection of cloth and thread. There were bullet wounds all over, on his back, on his legs, even on his head. It was an injury so severe, I felt the pain on my own body.

His face laid away from my line of sight, and I could not see what his last thoughts were. It was all covered by his long, limp brown hair, now matted and stained with blood. I swallowed the bile in my throat, finding great difficulty in doing so, and forcefully yanked myself into reality.

I walked away from his body, growing colder and stiller with each step I took.

I didn't look up the entire time until we finally arrived at the dorm room. I did not want to look into the eyes of a potential murderer among my classmates. I was afraid of what emotion, what despair, lied within in their gaze. It taunted me knowing that one friend was murdered, and another was the killer. It just didn't seem real.

The room looked exactly the same as it did when I first stepped foot into it this morning, when I went to look for Makoto. I instinctively shivered. To think that was only this morning, when he was still alive. And somehow, his life was gone in an instant, so quickly, that I did not believe it. I was suddenly reminded with pain and ache, that everybody's lives here are so, so vulernable.

In the middle of the room, stood Mondo and Sakura, standing guard of the entire scene. The pair were tall, well muscled, and quite the intimidating duo. Their eyes were locked on the door each time someone entered, and when it was my turn, they turned to glare right at me. I, slightly domineered, awkwardly waved back.

"Um, hi, I'm just here to investigate." I explained. Both answered me with a silent nod of their head, and I was let into the battlefield-like dorm room.

I went to check out the walls of the room firts. The walls, just as I remembered, were roughened and slashed up, seemingly by a long blade of sorts. When I stepped closer on my toes, careful to avoid the debris beneath me, I could see that some bits of the wallpaper were peeling off as a result. 

I ran my fingers over one large, length gouge mark carved on the way. The grooves beneath my fingers were jaggy and scratchy, as if the attacker didn't prepare to make a cut in the wall. The slash was more diagonal, like they were trying to hit a target, but missed. I shuffled over to the rest of the scratches along the wall and felt each of them with my hands. I was surprised to discover that a few differed in texture from the first one.

These slashes were slightly smaller and thinner, and cut a bit more cleanly through the wall. I dug my finger into the engraving and ran it all along the length of the gash. It was shorter, too. In fact, each cut varied in length, hinting at the possiblity that these were caused by accident. And judging from the difference in texture and size, I assumed that different blades were used to create these slashes.

The question is, what two blades were used? 

Naturally, I supposed one of them was the murder weapon, which had to be the kitchen knife, lodged inside Sayaka's chest. The slim, shorter cuts along the wall could plausibly pass for a wound made by a knife. But what about the second weapon?

My answer, it appears, was lying on the ground in front of me.

I stepped away from the wall to get a better analysis of the patterns, but as I did, my foot bumped into something on the floor. Almost tripping over, I hastily found my footing, and shot a glare at the object that aided in my downfall.

It was a sword sheath, fashioned anciently, painted in pure gold.

I bent down, pulling my knees to my chest, and gingerly picked up the sheath, careful not to taint the evidence. As I turned it over, I realized something rather odd.

All along the sheath, were scratches of some sort, similar to the ones I found on the wall. It seemed to have been struck many times by a sharp object. 

But if the sword itself was used in the fight, how did the sheath get scratched up? 

I felt myself frown and furrow my eyebrows in deep thought. While I was almost certain the replica sword blade lying a few feet away was used in the struggle, it didn't make sense for the sheath itself to be damaged. If someone were to attack another with a sword like this, the first thing they'd do was to unsheathe it. Not to mention the cover was also sturdy and heavy; it could easily get in the way of a strike.

After a while of swimming in my thoughts, I decided to save the theories for the trial. With a deflated sigh, I let my wrist fall slack and the golden sheath tumbled from my grasp, falling to the floor with a soft clunk. I stood up straight once again, instinctively smoothing my skirt down my legs, and resumed in my search for evidence.

I spotted the glittery, long blade resting from afar right away, and decided to take a closer look at the weapon itself. Perhaps it could hold some clue as to why the sheath was damaged as well.

But as I began to walk to the sword, discarded on the ground, something else caught my eye instead. My steps faltered as I turned to have a closer inspection of what it was.

It was a dorm key, just like any other, lying right next to the sword on the floor.

I kneeled down and peered at the key through narrowed eyes. It seemed to have a blue block attached to the silver key with Makoto's name on it. Without a doubt, this was his room key. 

If Makoto had left this morning to the dining hall, he would certainly have been carrying his room key to lock the door behind him. However, here it was, tossed carelessly on the floor, like it was a piece of trash. My eyes fluttered close as I dug through my brain for an answer as to why he left his own key here. Was it perhaps someone else had his key?

"You're wondering the same thing too, right, Junko?" I heard Kyoko's voice question. My eyes opened once again as I tilted my head to gaze at her. She was standing a few feet away from me, near the bathroom door, her arms crossed as she stared extensively at the key. "Why would Makoto leave his key in here?"

I wanted to get a greater observation of the silver key, but I knew better than to move it off the floor. So instead, I knelt and bore holes into the keychain with my eyes, trying to find an answer to my flood of questions. Beside me, Kyoko sighed deeply.

"It would've been a lot easier if Makoto was here," she admitted, sounding rather dispirited. "But, of course, he's..."

She didn't have to finish her sentence for me to understand what she was trying to say. It was the truth; the whole investigation and trial would be a whole lot easier if Makoto was with us. After all, the murder took place inside his room, and he was the closest to Sayaka. Unfortunately, he suffered the same fate as she did, and could no longer aid us in discovering the truth behind this case. 

"Anyways, enough about that," Kyoko shook her head and bent down next to me, laying the tips of her fingers against the blue tiled floor. "I've found something odd that I'd like you to know about."

"Huh?" I turned to look at her, and saw that she was tracing lazy circles against the ground with a gloved fingertip. 

"There's something very unusual about this room," she began, lifting her hand and showing me her finger. It was spotless, devoid of any dust or debris, which was indeed odd, considering we had spent quite some time here already. "I've searched the floor from one corner to another, and I didn't find one single strand of hair."

Almost by instinct, I felt for the floor as well. "Really?"

"Not one hair from the victim, and not even one hair from Makoto, even though he'd been living here," she explained, appearing deep in thought. She grasped her chin with her fingers. "That's rather strange, don't you think?"

"Yeah," I breathlessly agreed. With each new piece of evidence, I discovered that the whole case was more and more complicated than I had thought. It seemed that whenever I would come up with a theory, it would be wiped out by a new clue. "But...how?"

Kyoko didn't budge from her position as she replied, "I found a lint roller in the room," she said. "It looked like it had been used before. I don't know whether or not Makoto used it himself, but these two pieces of evidence certainly do tie together."

Conjectures began to pile up inside my head as soon as she said that. Maybe, the killer used the lint roller to clean the room? Or perhaps was it someone else? I didn't have the slightest certainty towards either of those, but I decided to hang onto my ideas for now. I next shuffled over to the sword I had originally kept my eye on before.

It was long in length, seemingly menacing, although on closer inspection, I found that it was a mere replica sword. Not a real metal blade, but I was sure it could still do some damage. The slashes on the walls were proof of that. I inched closer, my body bent at the waist as I tried to examine the sword better.

The sword, just like its sheath, was completely coated with gold, glittery paint. It was safe to assume both came from the same place. When I leaned closer to the blade, my eyes immediately widened. It appears that some of the gold coating had come off of parts of the blade and the handle. Especially the handle: there was more white than gold at this point, as if it had been all rubbed off unevenly.

Despite my inner conscience scolding me not to touch it, I did. My fingers brushed against the remaining flecks of paint splattered onto the handle, and when I pulled away, I discovered that some of it had latched onto my skin. A mere touch of this blade would stain the hand at once. I came to the conclusion that whoever wielded this sword, which I presumed to be Sayaka, would've gotten some on their hand.

I pushed myself into a standing position and attempted to find my balance for a moment. Once I had secured myself, my eyes scanned the trashed room for any more remaining clues. I told myself I was just trying to be analytical, but really, I was buying all the time I could to prevent myself from inspecting the body myself. 

I found myself pacing around the room, my steps brisk and brief as my mind raced around in circles, getting entangled in this murder mystery. We no longer had a prime suspect; anyone could easily be the culprit. My brain created a dozen scenarios of what happened that night, each featuring one of unlucky classmates. After a while of being distraught, I let out a loud sigh and ran my fingers across the rough bedsheets to the right of me.

The bed had also been scratched up, it seems. The sheets were slashed ferociously, as if a wild animal had clawed its way through. The jagged, split fabric scraped my skin as I felt around it. 

The unmade, torn bed, the scored walls, the gashed floorboards, it was all adding up. These were clear evidences of a struggle. 

I did not want to dwell on that appalling thought for any longer than I had to, so I reached for the first thing I saw, which happened to be a desk drawer beside the bed. My hand yanked the compartment open with ease as my finger hooked under the handles, and I was greeted with the sight of a toolbox resting cozily inside.

I suddenly recalled Monokuma's note from earlier. All the girls had sewing kits, while all the boys owned toolkits. This was, without a doubt, Makoto's toolkit, lying abandoned and unused at the moment. He was most likely thinking the same as me; there was no need to egg Monokuma on by opening and putting these tools at use.

"So, his toolkit's unused," I heard myself mumble underneath my breath. "Hm."

"Oh yeah," Mondo's voice was suddenly being directed towards me, coming out unexpectedly from nowhere. My head whipped around to face him. "None of the guys have opened their toolkits yet. We were just talking about it yesterday. It's not like we're gonna built furniture or shit like that, so why would we open it?"

"You're right." I nodded, sliding the drawer to a close. It shut with a noisy, wooden _clink_. "There's really no use for these at this moment. Monokuma's just being a dick."

This was the first time I ever heard Mondo genuinely laugh. "Hah, I like you. I feel like we can actually get somewhere in this hellhole." 

Before I could figure out a response to that, I heard someone call my name.

"Junko!" I turned to discover it was in fact Kyoko, standing beside the bathroom door. My blood froze to panic heavy ice, stilling in the midst of their flow.

"H-Huh?"

"There's something I want to discuss with you." She beckoned for me to enter the bathroom before swiftly disappearing behind that god forbid doorframe. I swallowed the rising fear expanding inside my throat and hastily began to follow her into the bathroom, my steps urgent yet wavering. 

I did not know if I was mentally prepared to see Sayaka's body once again. Seeing it once was enough gore for a lifetime, and I felt so traumatized, I could feel anxiety creep up on me at the mere thought of it. The blood, the knife, her corpse, it was all burned deep inside my brain in a spot where I would never be allowed to forget it. Each time I closed my eyes, or stilled my thoughts, the scene would come popping back up again, making me lightheaded with terror.

But I knew if I wanted to get out of this situation alive, I would have to face it again. No matter how terrified I was by the sight, I needed to investigate the crime, not just for me, or my classmates, but for Sayaka as well. I needed to uncover the truth behind her murder; it was the very least I could do for her now.

It took all of my strength and energy to keep my panic at bay. I repeatedly began to shove it further down inside my body, refusing to let it bubble up and spill out. It was like compressing a pillow too big for its container. Each time I pushed it deeper within me, it would come bouncing up again, up into my face. 

My heart raced a dozen rapid laps inside my chest as I cautiously stepped into the bathroom.

And there she was.

Sayaka.

Oh, Sayaka.

Why did you have to die?

She was no longer the bubbly, strong willed, lighthearted young girl she used to be. She was now merely a shell of who she was, a rotting corpse lying against the shower. There was no more life inside her body anymore. No more hope.

Only death and despair.

Kyoko was already waiting for me inside. She was kneeling beside her collapsed body, hands delicately and expertly prodding each limb. She looked so focused, so familar, that I could not speak a single word to disrupt her search. She seemed completely immersed in her own world of investigation, and I did not want to break her concentration.

At last, she raised her head from the corpse to gaze at me, lingering in the doorway, eyes wide and watching. "Hey. You're here."

When I swallowed, I found that my throat was dry, like sandpaper, preventing me from speaking properly. When I did open my mouth, my voice was a bare rasp. "What did you want to talk to me about?"

In reply, she gestured me to come kneel next to her. I hesitated at first, doubting whether I really had the capability to sit next to the dead body of my former friend. My own blood pounded inside my eardrums as I comtemplated the repulsing decisions. Tearing the skin off my lower lip, I came to the conclusion that I would obliege.

"See her right wrist?" Kyoko said to me as soon as I found the courage to stand beside her. I fought the overpowering urge to vomit at the sight of her corpse, and the stench of her blood. It was just so much, _too_ much. My mind still hadn't caught up with reality yet, but when I touched her cold, slimy hand, I knew this was real.

My friend, who I had just been conversing with the day before, was now dead in front of me.

"The Monokuma File specified that it was fractured," Kyoko continued on without any sense of a problem. I was struck in awe at her valor. "It looks swollen and bloody, right? But here's the odd part: there's something glittery on her wrist as well." She pointed at the smallest speck of gold on Sayaka's skin. I peered as close as I could without feeling the compulsion to throw up. She was right; alongside the bruises and torn skin, were glitters of aurum. 

"Where have we seen this before?" She questioned me, as if she were a teacher quizzing her student. I knew the answer at once.

"It's...the paint from the replica sword." I said with difficulty. The words sounded heavy and jumbled inside my mouth, like cotton balls. It took me quite a lot of vigor to string them into a sentence and force them out.

"Correct. I wonder how it got here, on her wrist." Kyoko nodded. "The same goes for her other hand. Look closely."

I followed her clear instructions and inspected the left palm just as closely. This time, however, there was no evidence of an injury, except for the small dab of blood on her index finger. My eyebrows furrowed at the odd sight as I spoke my thoughts out loud, "Did she prick her finger or something?"

"Well, whatever happened to both of her hands, they obviously occured before she was stabbed," elaborated Kyoko. "I mean, the Monokuma File did say that the stab wound was her cause of death? So for her to have been injured on both hands, it must've happened before she was killed in here."

I tried to nod, but internally, I was struggling greatly in order to keep up. The world was spinning so fast, I could barely even comprehend a single thing. Was I really supposed to investigate my deceased friend's body? 

"Speaking of her cause of death, let's examine that too." Kyoko pointed to the unwieldy, honed, sharp edged knife protruding from her stomach. It was undoubtly used to cause the killing blow, as an abundance of her blood splattered and stained her clothes in the same area. To lose this much blood, I can only imagine how long you could survive before death overcame you. 

"Her death was dealt by a single stab to the abdomen," Kyoko murmured seemingly to herself. "Where did the killer obtain this knife?"

I sat and stared at the body for longer than I was comfortable with. It was all too complex, and I felt as if too many holes were left in our investigation. How could we string these scattered pieces of evidence together to uncover the killer? It seemed as if I had a new question to doubt each second. 

Seeing my lack of response to her rhetorical inquiry, Kyoko moved on to the next subject. "Well, I guess that's all there is to it. The Monokuma File only stated these two things about the state of her body." She stood up, but I was still kneeling on the floor, the soles of my shoes growing more and more red as time went on. "Shall we go?"

I was about to agree with her when something unfamilar suddenly caught my attention. 

Behind Sayaka's body, scribbled on the shower wall in crimson blood, was a sequence of Arabic numbers.

"Huh?" The surprised gasp slipped from my tongue as I shakily pointed to the bloody digits. "What's that?"

Kyoko's gaze was now heavily focused on the code, her eyes narrowed and glazed with thought. "1-1-0-3-7," she read, and then frowned soon after. "What does that mean?"

As soon as she said the numbers out loud, my mind would not stop repeating them inside my head. _11037, 11037,_ I wondered. I hadn't a clue on what this meant, but a nagging feeling inside my stomach told me that it was important. No matter what it really was, I decided to make note of it now, and keep it in my train of thoughts.

"If I had to make a guess, I'd say it was Sayaka's dying message," said Kyoko. Her tone was steely and solid, heavy with solemnity. "Judging by the way she wrote them, I think she wanted to use her body to block them."

"But..." My voice trailed off as I gawked at the bloody message scrawled on the wall to Sayaka's left. "Why?"

"She must've not wanted the killer to see it," she went on to explain. "That proves this code holds some sort of importance. Usually in most dying messages, it holds a clue about who the killer is. That must be why she wanted to hide them."

"The...killer?" I was utterly dumbfounded. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't seem to make a correlation with the random assortment of numbers. "Do you know what it means?"

"I'll give you a hint," Kyoko was already walking out from the doorframe, leaving me in a pool of Sayaka's drying blood. "Try pretending you are Sayaka, writing that message with her finger."

Her finger?

My gaze instantly shot towards her left hand, resting limply underneath the code of numbers. It was still there, that little spot of blood on her index finger.

Suddenly, I wasn't so sure that it was an injury after all.

Could she have used her own blood to write that message?

I tried what Kyoko instructed me to do, but I found no hope. I didn't know where or when she wrote it, or how, for that matter. My only firm conclusion was that she was stabbed, and using her last ounce of strength, she scribbled the numbers on the wall. Still, it gave me no leads on who the killer was.

A vigorous sigh left my lungs and slithered out into the cold air, stinking of death. I too stood up from the ground and brushed off my clothes of any lingering dust or blood. Right before I left the bathroom, I spared Sayaka's body one last glance.

It was hard to believe that she was even the same person.

I had never, ever, pictured her to die. It was the most horrifying thing in the entire world, to realize that someone who used to be alive: talking, touching, hearing you, was now fully and completely gone from existence. All that was left of them were their decomposing corpse, no longer the same person you used to know,

"Goodbye, Sayaka," I whispered into the air. "I'm sorry."

I refused to acknowledge that my last words to her were said so carelessly the day before, so I made those my departing message instead.

I exited the room.

Behind me, I tried to grasp onto the silver doorknob to gently close the door. Yet as soon as I did, the gadget nearly broke off and fell into my palms.

Instantaneously, I flinched and pulled my hand away, leaving the knob to hang slightly from its position. I felt my eyes widen at such an abnormal occurrence. 

"Wh-What the heck?" I heard myself exclaim. "The doorknob...?"

The object in question was dangling from its last remaining hinges, almost ready to fall onto the ground. It appeared to be battered and worn, as if someone had forcefully tried to yank the knob open. When I peered closer to get a better look at the beatings, a most interesting feature caught my eye.

The metal doorknob was unscrewed from its position.

Immediately, a river of unanswerable questions came pouring into my mind, staring with, why?

Using the very tips of my fingers, I brushed against the gadget and sensed it budging beneath my touch. It was obvious that a screwdriver was used in the process. But what was the need?

In most cases, I would assume the culprit was trying to unlock the door by unscrewing the knob, and unfortunately, ended up breaking the entire thing. But, I pondered, my eyebrows furrowing to form a creased stare. I found my own distorted reflection glaring back at me from the round, silver surface of the doorknob. This was a boy's bathroom. Only the girls' bathrooms could lock. 

That thought only sent me further down into the tunnel of perplexity. Why would someone need to unscrew the door to get it open when it didn't even bear a lock in the first place? Each new piece of evidence clouded my train of thought more and more as I went over them inside my head. Ultimately, I let out a defeated sigh and shook my head from side to side, coming to the conclusion that I would think about it all during the trial.

Not wanting to complicate my mind even more, I decided to leave the room for some fresh air. My footsteps were slight and quiet, almost softer than my own breathing, as they hit the ground. Without saying another word, I slipped out into the hall, brushing past Mondo and Sakura. 

Now suddenly in the halls, alone, I was left wondering where I should head next. I had already left Makoto's room, and I wanted anything but to go back inside and see the gruesome sight that remained there. The crime scene was the only notable area that was relevant to the murder, but I was almost certain that other places should hold clues too. My eyes found themselves shut as I tried to rummage through my mind for some leads. 

I remembered a saying I heard from somewhere: no matter how many people tell their knowledge about the crime, only the corpse holds the real truth. My consciousness started to float back to when I was investigating the body with Kyoko. 

_Where did the killer obtain this knife?_

The murder itself weapon: the knife.

Where had I seen it before?

There were not too many places I could think of inside the school building that could house a knife of that size. The only contact I had ever came in with a blade that large was on the first day, when I had found that curved, wicked knife inside the school store, and when I visited the kitchen each morning for my breakfast meals. 

Suddenly, I knew exactly where to visit next.

The dining hall was only a few paces away from the dormitory, so it took me mere seconds to burst inside the room. Unlike this morning, there was only a single person resting inside.

"Oh, hey, Junko!" greeted Aoi from the dining table. "What brings you here?"

"Just investigating," My eyes flitted to behind her, where the kitchen stood, unlit and ghastly. "What about you?"

She answered with an embarrassed chuckle. "Oh, um, I've just been hanging around," she replied sheepishly, scratching the back of her head. "I'm never good at this investigating stuff, and I totally don't have a single clue on what to do."

I felt the sincerity dwelling inside her voice. "I know what you mean," I agreed with all of my heart. "Everyone's super panicked and anxious, it's hard to understand what's going on."

"Yeah, and I was feeling super uneasy," Aoi said. "And I dunno why, but being in the dining hall helps keep me calm." Her gaze dropped to meet the ground and trace her sneakers. "And to tell the truth, I was doing the same thing last night, when Sayaka was killed. Me and Sakura were hanging around all night, and we drank some tea in the kitchen."

The kitchen. 

"Hm," I heard myself mumble at her words. If she was here, in the dining hall, last night, then could she have seen someone taking a knife? "I'm gonna go take a look inside the kitchen. There's...something I need to confirm."

Aoi appeared puzzled at my odd choice of statement, but gave me a nod of encouragement anyways. "Go ahead. I'll be right here."

I thanked her by giving her a smile that I hoped was comforting, and left Aoi in the dining hall to enter the dimly lit kitchen. My hand groped around the wall to find the light switch, and when my fingers finally bumped into it, I flicked on the lights and the room was filled with an immediate glowing brightness.

My eyes instinctively squinted at such brilliancy, and it took me quite some time to fully adjust to the luster. When I eventually grew accustomed to the room's light, my gaze wandered around the kitchen to begin its observation.

Just like always, there was a huge island in the center of the kitchen, crafted carefully from metal and housing so many pots and pans, I lost count as soon as I started. Plates, utensils, bowls, were all scattered around, remnants of today's breakfast. The stovetop was no longer warm, like it was after cooking, and when I put my hand on top of it, all I felt was cool iron. 

To my left laid an assortment of freezers and refrigerators, all different sizes and shapes. They were completely vast, holding quite an abundance of food inside. And to my right, was a humongous table adorned with fruits, vegetables, everything, separated into neat rows by color. I spotted ruby tomatoes, rich carrots, spicy peppers, juicy oranges, and everything in between. Monokuma wasn't kidding when he claimed that the supply was restocked each day.

Although getting briefly distracted by all the food, my focus was regained when I saw the collection of knives hanging on the far end of the kitchen. They stood right over a marble counter, where dozens upon dozens of cutting boards laid, and gleamed beneath the lustrous overhead lights.

I discovered that my footsteps were wobbly and lead filled as I made my way towards the knives on the wall. I was surprised that I didn't trip over my platform boots when I stabilized myself against the edge of the countertop. My eyes narrowed on the row of kitchen knives that laid before me, their sharp points taunting me to kill.

It would've been a perfect set of cutlery if not for the single missing blade amongst the assortment of knives.

It was just as I had thought: there was a knife missing from its spot, it seems. My conjecture was that the culprit stole the blade from the kitchen, and then proceeded to murder Sayaka with it. But alas, it was only a simple assumption, and I needed a testimony to back it up.

And I knew exactly who's testimony I required.

Keeping the missing knife fresh in my mind, I sprinted out from the kitchen and into the dining hall. I was in such a haste, I forgot to turn the lights off, leaving the room drenched in luminous light. My footsteps were loud, desperate, as I raced over to where Aoi stood at the long, polished dining table.

I started the conversation before she could even begin greet me. "Hey, so, did you notice that one of the kitchen knives is missing from the wall?"

Aoi's long, brown ponytail bobbed up and down as she nodded in agreement, and I felt a sudden rush of relief crash over me, like ocean waves, as she did so. Her eyes were focused and contemplating, and her irises were bright with thought. "Yeah, weird, huh? I thought it was kinda strange, a knife just suddenly disappearing like that."

I had one last confirmation to make with Aoi. "Oh, so it wasn't missing from the beginning?"

Much to my satisfaction, she shook her head. "Nope. Last I remember, they were all lined up in a nice, neat row," she recalled. The ferocity sparkling in her gaze informed me that she held much confidence in her answer. "At the end of the night, one of them was missing."

"So when did you notice one of them had disappeared?" I questioned, my mind scrambling around to grab a hold of her answers.

"Well, I went to go get some tea from the kitchen last night, and all the knives were still there," her voice was strained with vigor as she tried to clearly remember the happenings last night. "But when I finished my tea and went back into the kitchen to wash my glass, one of the knives was gone."

My fingers cupped my chin as I buried myself with ponder. My eyes naturally began to narrow when I spoke, "So you're saying the knife disappeared while you were drinking your tea in the dining hall?"

"Yeah..." Her voice mysteriously trailed off soon after that, and I wondered what other thoughts were weighing her mind. During a time such as this, it's impossible that anybody could be carefree and relaxed, when one of our kind has murdered another. It sent an instinctive chill down my spine, knowing that any of the people I meet with today could potentially be the killer. Suddenly, my determination dimmed, and I wasn't so sure if I could untangle this complicated case anymore.

"Um, thank you, Aoi," I forced myself into the present. The last thing I wanted was to come off as rude and ungrateful, so I shot her a thankful smile. "Your account means a lot. Thank you so much."

Her energy was visibly weaker now, but her smile still held the same friendliness as it did the first time I met her. "No problem. I'm glad to know I'm at least helping a little bit."

I laughed, but it was a lacking one rather than one of assurance. I hated how trembly my own voice sounded, but even I couldn't stop the fear coursing through my veins. I would learn to get used to the pulsing terror that dwelled inside my body, it seems. 

When I began to turn and step away, I heard Aoi's voice call out again, hesitant and feeble.

"Hey, by the way," she called. "Do you really think Makoto was innocent?"

My footsteps faltered and I came to a complete, chilling stop. At the mere mention of his name, I began to tremble inside myself, trying hopelessly to block out the gory images of his murder. Yet, my endeavors were all useless, and I was helpless to stop the flood of memories that came crashing down. My fingers were shaking as I brought them up to caress my face, unsure of what to say next.

"I-I don't know," was my final response, weak and unstable. "The murder did happen in his room, but..."

"I don't think he killed Sayaka," said Aoi. "I-I mean, this almost seems like a setup, like someone's trying to accuse him of murder so we would all vote wrong. But..."

He's dead now, I wanted to finish for her. There was no use in framing a dead man.

My jaw opened and closed again, failing to find any other words to answer with. Sighing with the heftiest regret, Aoi apologized, "Sorry for bringing it up again. It's just..."

"I understand."

Silence filled in the rest of our dying conversation. I stood there, unmoving, for I don't know how long, before I finally gathered enough courage to move on. I cleared my throat. "Um, I guess I should be going now. The class trial could begin at any moment."

Aoi's final departing smile held much sorrow and despair. "Alright then. I don't wanna keep you waiting."

With that, I eventually left her behind, and stepped back out into the dim, lonesome halls of Hope's Peak Academy.

Hope, my ass, I thought, shaking my head. That was the last thing I could grasp onto right now. Not only one, but two of my friends had been brutally murdered, and a third would soon follow. I didn't want to believe it, but there was absolutely nothing to wish for here. Unless it was for death, any prayers or yearnings would bear no fruit, and our meager hope was nothing but a toy for Monokuma to destroy. My fists clenched and my nails dug into my palms, leaving small crescents behind in the flesh. 

I felt my feet carry me to a destination I didn't even know of, as my consciousness swam inside my own thoughts of distaste. I was almost certain that nobody would give in the urge to kill, but perhaps, that video meant something to someone. I refused to acknowledge the fact that somebody here would murder for that abhorrent motive, yet here I was, investigating a crime inside my own school. 

My breathing, which was the only thing accompanying me in this forlorn journey of mine, quickly grew rapid from my increasing rage. I felt pure hate well up inside me; hate for the school, hate for the mastermind, hate for myself. Questions demanding for answers encircled my head. What the hell was this school anyways, letting students murder one another? Who in the world is the psycho behind all of this? What could I have done to prevent this?

It was until I finally halted in front of a lime green door, when I realized there was absolutely nothing I could do.

My arms trembled beside me. I was forced to face the fact that I could not do a single thing to stop anyone from falling into despair. No matter how much I hoped or wished or tried, nothing answered my voiceless calls.

I harshly grabbed and rubbed my skull with my hands, trying desperately to erase all of the heavy thoughts living inside my head. I couldn't afford to be depressed right now; I needed to discover the truth behind Sayaka's death. 

And I would start by investigating the room that oh so conveniently laid in front of me: the trash room.

Surely, I thought, there would be some clues lurking inside here. If a murder were to happen, it is definite that evidence would be left behind. Whether it be a smudge of blood, a weapon, a body, it could all trace back to the killer. So, the culprit must get rid of all they possibly could, to abolish any clues that would lead to them.

And where else to eliminate evidence, then the garbage room itself?

I closed my hand around the cool, metal doorknob, and gave it a good, firm yank. To no surprise, it opened quite easily, and I was more than relieved to safely step inside. However, when I did, I discovered another person already in the room, waiting for my arrival.

"Ah! Miss Enoshima, I d-didn't expect to see you here!" exclaimed Hifumi, flinching at my sudden appearance. I cocked my head and took a good look around the vast, toasty room, my eyes darting from one area to another. I noticed that there was a hatch on the floor, securely sealed by a lock and chain bolted around the door. Behind Hifumi was a large, wide shutter, blocking any further entry. I craned my neck as much as I could without pain to gaze way past him, and discovered an extensive incinerator at the end of the room. My eyes immediately widened at the sight.

"Hey, Hifumi." My line of sight did not leave the incinerator once, even when I began to converse with the large boy beside me. "I should be asking the same thing. Why are you here?"

Using a thick, stubbing finger, Hifumi pushed his small, circular glasses higher up his nose. "I'm on cleaning duty. I-I'm making sure no one comes to dispose of any evidence."

I nodded my head. He seemed to be thinking the same thing as I: that the killer might possibly enter the trash room to clean up their traces as we begin investigating. I narrowed my eyes, squinting to focus on the area that laid far away behind the shutters. 

When I did, my throat instantly dried, and I found that my lips were too parched to say a word.

"Has-Has anyone gone in here today?" I questioned, pointing a shaky finger behind Hifumi. His face bore clear confusion as he turned around.

"No, I'm the only one who can get past the gate, since I'm on cleaning duty." To prove his point, Hifumi pulled out a set of silver keys from his sweatshirt pocket, dangling them in front of his face for me to see. 

My mouth closed and reopened. I wasn't sure if I was hallucinating or not, but I needed to be sure. "Can you open the gate for me? I-I need to check something."

Hifumi chuckled, his voice going six octaves deeper than usual. The frame of his glasses lenses flashed dramatically beneath the light. "Of course. Anything for the pretty lady."

I hoped he could read my clear signs of discomfort when he used the keys to open the shutter.

At his word, the gate noisily began to rumble and groan, trembling and screeching as the metal teeth lifted from the ground and into the air. The sound that emanated was so deafening, I was sure I had lost my hearing for that brief moment. Time seemed to slow down as the shutters finally retracted into the ceiling, leaving me in a stunned silence.

"So, what was it that you need?" Hifumi's voice was back to its usual high pitch as he anxiously questioned me.

"I need to...check something," I tried to be vague, as I wasn't even sure "something" existed or not. My mind could possibly be playing tricks on me, but in a situation like this, you could never be so sure. "It's by the incinerator."

"Ah! I get it now!" He abruptly declared, jabbing a meaty index finger at me. I flinched from his sudden, vigorous action, and began to back away with confusion meddling my expression. "You've been deceiving me this entire time, haven't you, Miss Enoshima?"

"H-Huh?" The sound escaped from my raspy throat, wavering with sheer puzzlement. 

"You're the true killer, aren't you!" He went on to shout. "And you're just trying to dispose any remaining evidence here!"

"Wh-What? No, I'm not!" I immediately came to my own defense, waving him off in dismissal. He didn't seem convinced, as he still wore that serious yet horrified look on his face, brows creased with worry. I sighed out of vexation. "I just saw something the actual killer might've left behind. So, if you'll excuse me..."

I didn't leave him any time to continue rambling about how _I_ was the killer, before sprinting all thirty feet over to the incinerator. 

However, my pace was lowered as soon as it started when I spotted the shatter glass spread on the ground in front of me.

So, it was true.

I was not seeing things. There really was evidence the killer left behind, after all.

I knelt down to get a closer inspection of the broken glass. It was lying right in front of the incinerator, as if someone had tried to toss it inside, but failed. The remains appeared to be once a part of a glass ball, perhaps baseball sized. I was careful not to cut myself on the shards when I gently touched a splinter.

"I-Is that...?" I heard Hifumi ask from behind me. He seemed to be gasping for breath, and I felt regretful for making him run after me. "A crystal ball?"

"Crystal ball?" I echoed, whipping my head around to face him. My hair, of course, lashed against my cheek, and I brushed it away with an irritated swipe of my hand. "Could it be Yasuhiro's?"

"I-I think he said something about...losing his crystal ball," Hifumi panted out all of his replies. "I'm almost...positive it's his."

That was certainly something I needed to ask Yasuhiro personally. Yet, I hadn't a clue on where he was at this moment, and I was forced to guess and figure out on my own. For now, I tucked the biggest hunk of broken glass into my sweatshirt pocket, careful not to let the edges slice my fingers.

Before I could come up with any possible answers, Hifumi cried out, "What is that?"

I saw that he was pointing to a burnt piece of cloth lying limply on the ground, right in front of the incinerator. At first, I was unable to distinguish what it was, but when I peered just a bit closer, I discovered with horror that it was a bloody shirtsleeve. 

"H-Huh?" I whispered, my voice getting lodged inside my throat. It was an undeniable fact; a part of the sleeve from a button up shirt was on the tile floor in front of me, almost unrecognizable from its burnt edges. I was almost certain this piece of clothing belonged to the murderer. The blood, the placing, everything, all suggested that this was a piece of evidence the killer tried to burn, using the incinerator.

"It looks like a bloody shirtsleeve," I replied, standing up on my two feet. My knees were wobbly from some unknown reason, and I had to find my balance yet again. "I wonder if the killer tried to get rid of it?"

"Using the incinerator?" Hifumi added, his fingers reaching up to grasp his grubby chin. He hobbled over to the machine to examine it for himself, and I quickly followed, unsure of what's safe or not. "Hmm, very interesting."

I peeked over his shoulder to get a better view. My breath got stuck in my throat as I saw that the incinerator was still churning, working its best to keep running, which was rather peculiar to me. "Um, did you leave this on or something?"

"What?" He was in pure disbelief, and even managed to scoff at my words. "No, I wouldn't do something as foolish as..."

"Yeah..." My voice trailed off exactly the same as his did.

"Huh?" Hifumi exclaimed, beginning to sweat out of pure concern. I could tell that he was just as surprised as I. "Someone turned the incinerator on!"  
  
  


My eyes broadened as he confirmed the worst. "So, someone other than you turned this on during the night?"

Hifumi timidly nodded at my statement, nervously chewing on his short, jagged nails. "Very strange. I'm quite certain it was off last time I was down here," he stuttered out, quivering with apprehension. "Yesterday, as soon as I was appointed, I came down to check the place out. It definitely wasn't on then."

"And that was the only time you've visited the trash room?" I continued to interrogate him, pelting him him with raining questions. In a case like this, only the truth was enough to solve the whole mystery. And I needed to discover the entire truth.

"Yes, I'm sure," Hifumi concurred with a vigorous nod of his head. "And since I'm the only one who has a key to open the gate, it should be impossible for the incinerator to be on. And yet..."

"It's running right now." I concluded his sentence, sparing a glance at the noisy, rumbling machine that laid ahead of me. It was all so strange: how could someone turn the incinerator on without the key? Was there a secret passageway somehow, lying somewhere in the depths of this room? Perhaps, did Hifumi leave the gate open? As soon as a new possibility rose inside my head, I quickly crossed it out and refuted it with logic. Nothing made sense whatsoever. 

Maybe, the culprit was able to turn it on without even opening the gate itself?

I immediately frowned at my own wonders. It seemed almost impossible to do so. After all, there was at least a good thirty feet distance from the shutters to the incinerator, and there was absolutely no way someone could reach that far. I shook my head, exasperated and quite frustrated by the entire situation. It appeared there was no end to this case.

"This is very strange indeed," muttered Hifumi to himself. "When I was here last, the incinerator was off, and the glass shards and burnt clothes weren't. This must be the doings of Miss Maizono's killer!"

"I agree." My gaze was trained on the incinerator, groaning and shaking as it continued to operate. The noise deafened my ears until I could hear nothing else, and I reached out a single hand to press the yellow button to shut it off. It sputtered to a stop, and the immense waves of heat emanating from the machine soon died down, cooling my skin. I sighed deeply, inhaling the thick, smoky air that engulfed me.

This was only the first case of many more, and I still could not seem to get a lead on anything. I had searched the school to my full extent, and I gathered what seemed like too many clues, yet I didn't know a single thing. Was I really going to go through with all of this? 

Nobody, not even myself, could answer that daunting, heart stopping question. I didn't even have the time, because before I could get the chance, it was already playing.

That single, four note tune that sickened me to no end.

How was it so cheerful in a horrific place like this?

There were the fuzzy sounds of static, then flat, dead silence, as Monokuma's face spontaneously appeared on the monitor dangling inside of the trash room. I gritted my teeth at the sight of his annoyingly fake, cute bear face, and fought every nerve in my body that yelled at me to scream in spite. 

I needed more time. Much, much more time. 

But Monokuma seemed to have different plans in store for poor me.

"Um, so, ah..." His face was tinted swamp green from the poor quality of the monitor display, and every now and then, lines of disturbance would flick across the screen. I could see from where I was standing, that he was in a surveillance room of sorts, holding a single glass of elegant ruby wine. "I've already gotten bored of waiting. How about we just get started, hm?"

"No," I heard myself whisper, my voice scratching against the parched walls of my throat. "No, we need more time-"

He cut me off, possibly because he didn't hear me. Or even if he did, he showed no signs of any acknowledgement to what I had to say. "It's time for the long-awaited Class Trial!"

An incoherent growl must've escaped my lips, because Hifumi was beginning to look quite frightened of me as I glared right into Monokuma's beady little eyes.

"Now then, please enter the red door on the first floor in the school area," he proceeded to explain. He let out the most repulsive, irritating laugh I had ever had the displeasure of hearing. "I can't wait to see how you perform! See you soon!"

The screen cut to black once again, and my eyes were met with my own grimy reflection.

"The red door on the first floor," I echoed his exact words in a mumble. "I remember seeing that around these past few days."

Hifumi shrunk into himself out of raw, trembly fear. "D-Do we have to go?"

I lowered my gaze from off the high wall to stare into his own eyes, framed by shiny, circular glasses frames. "We have no choice. We gotta go. Come on."

Even as I said that, I felt my own stomach toss and turn within itself, and I resisted the urge to throw up for the nth time this gruesome day. I hadn't the slightest clue on what was going to happen as soon as we stepped into those doors, but I prayed for all to go well. It was an undeniable fact that I was extremely nervous, so nervous, that I couldn't stop myself from shaking as I exited the door and left Hifumi behind.

Luckily for me, the double red doors Monokuma had been preaching about were just around the corner, waiting for me to enter inside. With each step I took closer and closer to the entrance, I began more and more unstable. I swallowed a thick lump that clogged my throat, blocking any air from flowing into my lungs. Suddenly, I found myself unable to breathe.

My heart rammed against my chest, like it was trying its hardest to break through my ribs. My breathing only grew more and more rapid as the reality sunk in, and I realized that if we didn't succeed in finding the killer's identity, we would all be slaughtered like animals. My steps faltered.

I think for someone to feel an emotion like this, they would have to be facing a life or death situation. Only pure panic ran throughout my body, and I was nearing a mental breakdown.

I inhaled the deepest I ever had in my entire life.

When I released my huge gulp of air, I reminded myself to relax.

I needed to do this for Sayaka's sake.

My fingers trembled inordinately when I reached for the silver door handles.

Inside, I discovered that most everyone was already waiting.

The room behind the red doors was a small, cramped, cube shaped cabin with identical filthy marble walls and floors. The air reeked of aging dust and grime, and I coughed out some of the dirt infiltrating into my lungs. There was yet another pale neon monitor hanging on the wall, its blank face taunting me. One more security camera sat right above our heads, spying our every move, which made me uneasy, to say the least. And finally, sitting directly across from where I stood, was an old elevator, leading to who knows where.

I squeezed my fingers into a fist to stop them from shaking so hard.

"Junko! You're almost late again!" Kiyotaka greeted me with his usual exclamations about tardiness. I decided just to brush it off for now, as it was useless to object. "Do you have Hifumi as well?"

"Yes! I am here." I heard Hifumi call from behind me, and I immediately shuffled deeper inside the room to make space for him to fit. I found myself standing between Chihiro and Leon, joining the rest of my classmates in awaiting our next set of directions. My best guess was to take the elevator behind us, but with Monokuma, we could never be certain.

Speaking of which, he was talking to us once again.

Monokuma, just like last time, was lounging comfortably in an office chair inside the same, glowing room, holding a glass of wine in between his paws. It seemed like he didn't even move an inch. "Is everyone here? Okay, then." He stretched out a bit, seeming far too relaxed for what's about to come. "Please board the elevator in front of you, which will transport you to the courtroom. The courtroom that will decide all of your fates!" He even had the nerve to laugh. "I'm so excited! I'll meet you all down there. See you soon!"

And even though his face was gone from the monitor screen, I knew I would have to see that bastard once again, in this so called courtroom of his.

Mondo didn't hesitate once before voicing out his opinions. "So whoever stuck us here even took the time to set up a goddamn courtroom, huh?"

"It seems they are giving us every necessity we need," Celeste piped up, twirling a loose strand of lush black hair with her pale finger. "Their power sure is intriguing."

"Well, intriguing or not, we still gotta debate on who the killer is," Leon added, grumbling beneath his breath. He looked disrupted and anxious, the exact feelings I was experiencing as well. "Otherwise, we'll all die."

Byakuya smirked, startling me the slightest bit. "Such a high stakes game," his voice was calm, provoking, almost, like he was getting pleasure from all of this. "Alright. I'm in."

Without another word, he shoved past all of us and stepped into the elevator, getting swallowed by its whole.

"I guess...we should follow," said Aoi. "Let's get this over with."

We followed her into the steel box, soundless as we might.

This was possibly the most terrified I had ever felt for my own life.

It all depended on this unjustly trial right here. Whether we win or lose, live or die, hope or despair, all depended on our own choices. If we wanted to preserve and continue on living, we could have to sacrifice one of our own to do so. What pained me the most was not the fear of losing my own life, but the thought of someone else losing their's. The betrayal, the distrust, the despair that would build from this first Class Trial, would be one never to be forgotten.

As the doors slid close, so did my eyes.

I could hear my heart rate pounding inside my ears, creating a cacophonous rhythm that matched the beat of the elevator's metallic clunks as it descended further and further into the school. It was like the entire building was alive, tormenting my soul with this deadly trial that laid just a few minutes ahead of me. I was by no chance prepared, and I was forced to ultimately accept the fact that I would never be truly ready.

No matter how many Class Trials I would have to endure through, I would never, ever get used to this.

The elevator trip was far too short for me to recollect every thought, and before I even knew it, the doors had reopened once again. After spending some time in the dim, grisly elevator, I had to adjust my eyes to the sudden blinding light that showered upon me.

And when I finally blinked the darkness out of my gaze, what greeted me was an odd circular room, with deep navy walls and crimson curtains. Tall, golden pillars, each bearing a deliberate carving, stretched as high as I could see. Three headed lamps decorated along the walls, illuminating the entire place with a ghostly pale light. The floor was a black and white checkered tile ground, the pattern spinning my head into dizzying circles. In the complete center of the room, was a set of wooden podiums, all with empty seats, waiting for each of us to fill in. I sucked in a breath at the view.

It really was a courtroom.

"Yay! You've finally arrived!" I could never stop my heart from freezing each time I heard that voice. When I shakily turned my head around, I was greeted by Monokuma, in the flesh, sitting on top of a ruby and aurum throne, like a judge. He was as laid back as ever when he giggled out, "What do you think? Doesn't it feel just like a real courtroom?"

"This place is disgusting." retorted Mondo from far away, scoffing from Monokuma's ridiculousness.

"Jeez, what a way to put down my feelings," Monokuma deflated, sinking deep into his plush raised chair. "Whatever, just go find your assigned seats and we'll begin!"

So our positions were assigned to us, I thought as I paced around in a large, swooping circle around the set to find my own. It didn't take me long to find it, and when I did, I quickly raced to stand behind the safety of my podium. I gripped the wooden bar in front of me with my palms, my knuckles turning a fleshy white.

To my right was Hifumi, appearing the most distressed I had ever seen him.

To my left, was a slender wooden stand, painted black, with Sayaka's photo, adorned with a bright red "X" over her face.

My eyebrows furrowed at such a strange sight, and felt an unexplainable shiver run through me. What was her picture doing here? 

"Before we begin the trial, can I ask a question real quick?" Kyoko and I seemed to hold the same wonders, as she pointed to the photo to her right, just beside Sakura. It was a photograph of Makoto, bearing the same red cross as Sayaka's portrait did. "What's going on with...those pictures?"

Monokuma was more than happy to elaborate. "I'd feel awful if they got left out just because they died," his voice displayed a slow, cloy, sickening sadness. "Friendship penetrates even death's barrier!" 

"Friendship...penetrates?" Hifumi repeated from my right, clearly distraught by Monokuma's odd choice of words.

Celeste seemed to have questions of her own. "Okay, but what about that other empty seat?" She pointed a slim finger to the vacant podium directly across from me, which, discomforting enough, just so happened to be in front of Monokuma's chair as well. "There were only fifteen of us to begin with, so why are there sixteen seats?"

Monokuma, in answer, simply waved her off with his paw, like he was clawing invisible enemies to shreds. "Oh, no reason. It's just that our little courtroom can technically hold up to sixteen people."

That was a strange reply, but I knew better than to doubt Monokuma like that, so I took his word for granted.

"Okay, let's finally get to the point!" Monokuma declared, clearing his throat all too dramatically. "Let's begin with a basic explanation of the class trial! So, your votes will determine the results. If you can figure out "whodunnit", then only they will receive punishment. However, if you pick the wrong one," His tiny, hooked silver claws unsheathed themselves from his left black paw, and I instinctively flinched away. "then I'll punish everyone _besides_ the blackened, and the one that deceived everyone else will graduate!"

"And...the culprit is really one of us, right?" My voice was soft, unbelieving, but I secretly knew it was indeed the truth.

"Of course! There's no doubt about it!" Monokuma exclaimed, giddy at the ultimate start of our debate.

Kiyotaka decided to take matters into his own hands. "Okay, then...everyone close your eyes, and whoever did it, raise your hand!"

"Oh my god, you're such a goddamn idiot," Mondo groaned out of agitation, face palming immediately at the thought. "Why the hell would they raise their hand?"

"Well, I was thinking it could possibly work!" Kiyotaka argued. "You'll never know!"

"I see that you've already started to debate amongst yourselves!" Monokuma said, snickering into both of his paws. "Now then, shall we begin?"

Aoi was quite hesitant to proceed in the trial. "Even if you say, "let's begin", how? I don't know where to start in all of this."

"We'll first start by summing up the case, and deciding the order of events," answered Kyoko. She was the most calm and collected out of everybody here, and showed no signs of disturbance on her expression as she went on. "Then, from there, we can find out who the killer is."

"I assert that the one who was murdered was Miss Sayaka Maizono!" affirmed Kiyotaka, sounding rather confident in his answer. Which would be plausible, because it was the absolute truth.

"Yeah, we know that part already." Yasuhiro muttered, shaking his head. Whether from disappointment or disbelief, I couldn't tell.

Byakuya did not hesitate to state his knowledge of the crime either, ignoring Yasuhiro's previous unnecessary comment. "And the murder took place in Makoto's room." He said, shooting a glare at the crossed out photo of Makoto's face, a sigh of irritancy accompanying his words.

"Yeah, in the shower, too." Aoi added, clearly uncomfortable with discussing the whole case. I didn't blame her: even I was struggling to keep cool in this twisted trial.

"So it seems most likely that the killer must've taken her by surprise while she was in the bathroom," Chihiro concluded. 

While I was trying my hardest to suppress my emotions from bubbling over, I tried to relive my investigation to distract myself. I was suddenly brought back to earlier today, where I had been checking out the crime scene by myself. The long, deep slashes on the wall, the scuffed bedsheets, the slit tile floors, all came back as vivid images in my mind. 

"She didn't even have a chance to resist."

I was abruptly shoved back into the present, regaining my senses. "Wait a sec, Chihiro," I slowly began to say as my memories resurfaced. "Try remembering what Makoto's room looked like. There was damage dealt everywhere, like the walls and the floor and even a desk. I think those are all definite signs of a struggle."

"A struggle?" repeated Chihiro, her eyes wide and afraid. Afraid of the outcome, afraid of the killer, afraid of the truth. "Between who and who?"

"Between Sayaka and the killer, of course," I replied, narrowing my eyes to gaze at the podium in front of me. I stared long and hard, until I felt my irises tremble from the intensity. "I don't think it was an ambush, seeing how things were."

"She must have been attacked in the main room first, then ran to the bathroom to try and hide," continued Celeste, deeply immersed in her own world of thoughts. Her finger was placed delicately beneath her chin as she added to her theory. "The killer followed her in, and that's where they finished the job."

Byakuya merely scoffed at our swift conversation. "That much should have been obvious after taking one look at the scene." 

Chihiro shrunk back in her seat. "S-Sorry..."

I wanted to assure her that it was quite alright, but before I could even open my mouth, Yasuhiro had already opened his. "Okay, so, what's next?"

"I say we discuss the murder weapon next," Sakura said, crossing her arms across her bulky chest. "So, what was used to kill her?"

"The sharp object that was thrust into her stomach was, without a doubt, the murder weapon!" announced Kiyotaka.

Mondo growled, letting a huff of spiked spite escape from his lips. "So the killer used some random knife they had on them. What a dirty bastard." 

"So, did they bring that knife to school?" Hifumi gasped, his face paling. "T-That's dangerous!"

I could not imagine anyone bringing a knife to the academy. It should be too large, too deadly to conceal flawlessly. There was only one possibility I could think of that explained the knife's origin.

"No." My rebuttal was almost too quiet, so I shook my head and declared it in a louder tone. "I do think it was a knife. But not just some random knife - I'm almost positive it was a kitchen knife."

"Huh?" Mondo was struck off guard, blinking towards me in puzzlement. "A kitchen knife? How can you be so sure?"

"Well, think about it," I suggested, brushing a loose part of my bangs back to fold behind my ear. "After the murder, we discovered that one of the knives from the kitchen was missing."

Sakura nodded her head, seemingly agreeing with my argument. "Which means that knife must be the murder weapon."

"Oh, yeah," Mondo shrugged, scratching the back of his nape. "I guess that makes sense, now that you say it out loud."

"Okay, so the murder weapon was a kitchen knife," recapped Leon, opening his palms to form a natural hand gesture. "But where does that get us?"

"W-Whoever killed Sayaka must've t-taken it from the kitchen, right?" Toko muttered her thoughts out loud for the rest of us to hear. "M-Maybe it was Makoto, a-and he did it when nobody was in the d-dining hall."

"Okay, wait, hold on, I'm pretty sure Makoto is _not_ the culprit," I cut through her words before anyone could add anything else. "I mean, for one, he's dead, so there's no way we're doing a trial when the culprit's dead already."

"It's probably another one of Monokuma's tricks again." Leon grumbled, ruffling his fiery hair out of pure distress.

"His body is literally decomposing on the ground as we speak," I was getting more and more frustrated, and to be honest, a little annoyed, at how stubborn they all were. It was too blatantly obvious; this must be some sort of set up. "And he sure as hell didn't take that knife from the kitchen. Right, Aoi?"

Aoi jumped back from her position, startled by the sudden shift of attention onto her. "Huh?"

"Remember what you were telling me earlier?" I said. "You were in the dining hall last night when the knife disappeared, right?"

Aoi blinked a few times, trying to decode what I was saying. "Y-Yeah, that's right."

"And at any point while you were there, did you see Makoto ever enter the dining hall?" I felt rather ridiculed that I needed to prove how a dead man was not the culprit, but I guess it was all for the better.

"Um," she furrowed her eyebrows as she tried to recall, before finally shaking her head. "No, I don't think so."

"W-Well, what if you're just t-trying to protect him b-by lying?" Toko jabbed a shaky finger to accuse Aoi, who cringed at such a thought.

"He's _dead_ , Toko." She said.

Byakuya hummed once and turned to face Monokuma at the sound of that. "Speaking of which, I'd like to as the bear: if there is an accomplice, do they also become blackened?"

Monokuma's joy levels were through the roof to participate with the rest of us. "Each murder is allowed to have an accomplice," he elaborated. "But only the one who does the killing will get to graduate."

Kyoko seemed to be rather interested by this regulation. "So in other words, two people can work together, but one of them has no chance of profiting from it." She restated, her voice full of deep ponder.

"Exactly!" Aoi yelled, exasperated. "There's no way I would work together if it meant that!"

"Well," Chihiro brought up. "What if they _were_ working together, and just didn't know about that rule? Or their plan failed because Makoto died?"

Too many questions were starting to get into Monokuma's head, because he shouted, "Ugh! Good grief! Enough already! There are no accomplices in this case, okay!" He huffed, seemingly disappointed and cross by our curiosity. "Jesus..."

"So Aoi is telling the truth," I picked up the shambled conversation and let it run again. "Makoto didn't take the knife, so he's not the killer."

"Which should've been quite obvious from the beginning," Byakuya had the audacity to roll his eyes and sigh. "If you used your small brains and put it to work, logic should say it's impossible for Makoto to be the killer."

"Okay, so," Yasuhiro ignored Byakuya's rather rude comment, which I admired him to do so. "Who _did_ take the knife? Someone must've done it, right?"

"Aoi seems like the obvious candidate," Right after I cleared Makoto's name, Celeste began to shoot after Aoi, backing her into an unreasonable corner. "After all, she just said she was in the dining hall."

Aoi's eyes widened in pure shock and backed away from her stand. "N-No way! I swear it wasn't me!"

Hifumi chuckled darkly, pointing a meaty finger towards her direction. "Sure, but can you or anybody else prove that?"

"I can."

Everybody immediately whipped their heads around to face the tall, muscular woman by the name of Sakura Ogami.

Aoi instantly brightened at her dear friend's defense. "That's right! Sakura was with me the entire time I was drinking my tea. She can testify!"

"Well, couldn't either of them grabbed the knife? And then stabbed Sayaka with it?" Leon suggested.

"If that's the case," I frowned at his words. I was certain a look of sheer concentration was stretched across my face from how hard I was thinking. "Then the other one of them would've seen it. And if I remember, Aoi told me she and Sakura were together the whole night," I glanced at the aforementioned to confirm what I just said. She gave me a swift, frightened nod in return, so I continued to speak. "So, there was no window of time for one of them to steal the knife and kill Sayaka without the other one witnessing it. And according to Monokuma, there are no accomplices in this case, so that rules teamwork out."

Byakuya scoffed, and for a split second, I was afraid I had said something wrong. But he merely spat, "Hm. I guess you're smarter than you look, cover girl."

I didn't know whether that was a compliment or insult, so I just ignored it for now.

"But if it wasn't either of them," said Celeste. "What other possibility is there?"

"Actually," spoke Sakura, nodding at Aoi. "There _is_ one other possibility. Right, Hina?"

Aoi slammed her fist into her palm as she suddenly recalled. "Oh, yeah! That's true! One other person did come to the dining hall while we were there."

"Why didn't you mention it earlier?" Byakuya questioned, although it sounded more like a menacing threat for a demand.

Aoi's eyes dropped to meet her sneakers and her face quickly darkened with guilt. "Well, 'cause she's dead now."

She?

There were only two dead students among us, and one of which was already declared innocent.

"A-Are you saying it was Sayaka herself?" My voice stumbled and hobbled with bewilderment and confusion. I had never suspected that the victim was the one to take the murder weapon.

"Yeah." Aoi proved. "She was the one who came to the dining hall. And then later, she wound up dead..."

I was having a difficult time trying to comprehend it all. How could Sayaka have taken the very own thing that ended up killing her? For all I knew, it certainly wasn't suicide, so how did the culprit use her own knife to murder her?

"That's the only possibility," Sakura nodded in agreement. "And thinking back on it, she was acting kind of unusual. When she came into the dining hall, she didn't even look at us. She just went straight to the kitchen."

"So..." I began to say, trying to force my thoughts into understandable words. "Sayaka took the knife while you were in the dining hall?"

"Yes, she claimed she just wanted a drink of water," continued Sakura. "But most likely, she was trying to steal the knife."

Kiyotaka seemed to be following along quite well, unlike me, buried in my own doubts. "Then the person who took the knife was the victim herself!" He exclaimed.

"So you're saying," Byakuya said, his voice flat and devoid of any lingering emotion. "The knife she took was then taken from her, and she was killed with it?"

"It appears that was the case," stated Celeste, folding her hands on top of one another. "If so, how did the culprit take the knife away from her?"

I found myself closing my eyes, the eerie world around me suddenly fading to ink. I searched deep through my memories, trying my hardest to recall all I had investigated a few hours before. It was amazing yet irritating how fuzzy my memory got in such a short period of time.

"Well," I began slowly, my lips struggling to form the words. "It certainly wasn't an easy task, considering the whole room was messed up. The walls and floor were all scratched, and even the bathroom doorknob was broken."

"So after the killer stole the knife from Sayaka in the main room," Mondo theorized, trying to clear the whole image of the case. "She escaped into the bathroom, and they tried to unscrew the bathroom door to kill her."

"But why?" asked Chihiro, her small, trembly hands clasped together. "If the murder happened in Makoto's room, a boy's bedroom, they shouldn't have gone through the trouble of breaking the door, because it can't be locked, right?"

"Huh? So it wasn't locked?" Leon blinked a few times, confusion scribbled all over his face.

I shook my head. "If I remember correctly, Monokuma's letter said only the girls' bathrooms could be locked." I explained, giving the bear in question a questioning glance. "There was no lock on Makoto's bathroom door, but..."

"The killer broke the door anyways, even though it wasn't locked." Kyoko was in a full trance of pure concentration, utterly determined to get through this case. "That leads to another piece of evidence I found while investigating."

"New evidence?" Yasuhiro echoed, sounding awfully perplexed by her sudden offer.

Kyoko simply nodded at his inquiry. "While I was searching the scene of the crime, I found something rather interesting," she started to elaborate, her voice audible and unwavering. "I found that the nameplates on two of the rooms, Makoto and Sayaka's, were switched. Which means, thanks to the swapped nameplates, the killer could've easily mistaken Makoto's room for Sayaka's, and believed that the room belonged to a girl's, thus leading them to think the door could lock."

"So that means the killer didn't know that Makoto and Sayaka had switched rooms," Byakuya resolved, shaking his head feebly. "Hm. I guess Makoto was telling the truth after all."

"S-So," Toko gulped, biting her nails out of pure anxiety. "T-The culprit h-had to have been anyone _b-but_ Makoto!"

"Which kinda should've been obvious from the start," Aoi shrugged, visibly disheartened by her peers' stupidity. "But oh well."

"Then why did the killer have trouble opening the door?" Kiyotaka wondered out loud. "I mean, if it didn't even have a lock, it should've been easy to open, right?"

Celeste sighed deeply, relaxing her shoulders. "I regret not having Makoto with us," she admitted, interlocking her pale, slender fingers. "He was the only one who knows the answer, and now, he is dead."

I was about to agree with her statement, but then quickly caught myself before I could do so. "Wait, he's not the only one," I refuted, jerking my head up to meet Monokuma's beady black eyes, staring at me from where he sat on the throne. "Monokuma! You know, right? Why Makoto's door was difficult to open?"

"Hm?" The robotic bear tipped his head to the side. "Oh, yes! It's actually quite simple. His bathroom door wasn't fitted properly! That's why it couldn't open normally." 

"Well," I gestured distractedly towards the now laughing bear. "There you have it. The killer, who wasn't aware of the swapped rooms, came into Makoto's room thinking it was Sayaka's. They quarreled in the main room first, before Sayaka lost the knife and fled into the bathroom. The killer, believing that the door was locked, broke the doorknob with a screwdriver and killed Sayaka inside, not knowing it was merely poorly fitted."

"That certainly seems accurate." agreed Kyoko, somewhat of a trace of a smile adorning her lips. I felt a small rush of pride lap at my chest, grateful at how I figured it out.

"Wait, but," Aoi said, glancing to the side with a slight frown on her face. "How'd the culprit get into Makoto's room in the first place? It didn't seem like a break-in."

"Maybe Sayaka just dropped the key somewhere and the culprit picked it up," Leon suggested, running his fingers through his spiky red hair once again. "That's possible, right?"

Kiyotaka shook his head, voicing his clear disagreement. "I don't think so. That seems way too convenient."

Chihiro was the next to speak. "Maybe they picked the lock?"

"No, I don't think that's it either," Sakura said. "Monokuma made it quite clear that the locks were all unpickable."

"Fine, how about this?" Hifumi pushed his glasses to better fit his line of vision. "The killer got in the easy way: they could've knocked and said they wanted to talk or something, and Miss Maizono just let them it!"  
  
  


Leon shook his head gruffly. "Why the hell would she just open the door for some rando in the middle of the night?"

"No wait, I think he might be right," Kyoko was reaching for something tucked away in her suit pocket. I instinctively leaned forward, curious of what she had in store. "Take a look at this."

When she pulled out her hand, out came a folded sheet of paper.

"W-What is that?" I asked, squinting my eyes so I could read it. My attempts were all in vain, as the whole sheet was scribbled messily with charcoal, preventing me from reading any legible letters.

"It's a notepad I found inside Makoto's room," Kyoko elaborated, holding the paper higher up so everyone in the courtroom could see. "I shaded in the top sheet with a pencil and found a message imprinted on the page. It clearly asked the reader to meet with the author in their room, and even check the nameplates so they could get the room correct. It was signed by Sayaka, so we can safely assume she was the one who wrote it."

"So Sayaka invited someone over to her room?" Yasuhiro said, crossing his arms. "But why?"

"Judging from the note," Byakuya was ten steps ahead of everybody else in thinking. "She must've switched the nameplates because she wanted to trap someone in the room she was in, and also fool them into thinking it was her room, and not Makoto's."

"Trap?" Mondo repeated. "Yo, hold on, hold on, what do you mean by 'trap'?"

Byakuya simply scoffed and smirked at our ignorance, as if he were superior to us all in this thinking game. "You don't get it, don't you? She clearly wrote that note to lure the killer into Makoto's room, kill them, and frame Makoto in being the killer."

My eyes instantly widened, and I whipped my head around to face him. When I did, I saw that he was indeed smirking. "Wh-What? Frame him?"

"You do remember how shaken up she was after that video, right?" Byakuya deadpanned, like the truth was that painfully obvious. "It's perfectly reasonable for her to have a motive and set out to kill."

"But they were such close friends!" I tried to talk myself out of it. There was no way the world's sweetest idol singer, Sayaka Maizono, would kill someone and frame her best friend just to escape. That just wasn't who she is, or now, was, as a person. 

"Which made it all the much easier for her to manipulate him," Celeste was slowly taking Byakuya's side, nodding along her words. "She somehow convinced him to switch rooms, and seeing how protective Makoto was of Sayaka, there was no reason for him to turn it down. That all played out flawlessly in her plan, no?"

"However," Byakuya was still smirking, and I wanted to reach over and slap across his face for saying such things. "Sayaka's plan failed because she allowed the idiot culprit to fight back, which led to her being murdered instead of the other way around. Judging by the state of the main room, it wasn't an easy fight."

"That reminds me," Sakura spoke up. "There was a replica sword at the murder scene. Was that perhaps used in the fight, alongside the kitchen knife?"

Kyoko hummed in agreement, leisurely nodding her head. "There were long slash marks all along the room wall. I'm pretty sure the sword was used to deal those cuts, because a simple knife can't possibly slice through that deep."

"I think it was used in another way as well," My posture snapped up to straighten itself as the truth dawned on me. Suddenly, I was thrown back to the investigation a few hours prior, where I had checked Sayaka's body alongside with Kyoko. "It seems pretty likely that the killer used it to break Sayaka's right wrist."

Leon's face instantly scrunched up in immediate doubt as he commented, "How the hell could you possibly know that's what broke her wrist?"

"Well," I closed my eyes and attempted to picture the corpse as best as my abilities allowed me. Fortunately yet unfortunately for me, I recalled the body as clear as day, for I could never forget the sight, even if it took a hundred years. My eyes fluttered open with realization."All you have to do is take a good look at her broken wrist, and it should become pretty clear. Right, Kyoko?"

I couldn't tell for sure, but I think she was rather amused that I had remembered such a detail. "Yes. Right where her wrist is all swollen, there's something glittery, like paint." 

"I touched the sword earlier during the investigation," I included, showing my hands for display even though they were spotless. "The paint from the blade comes right off, even with the slightest touch. The color and appearance of the glitter in both places are identical, and if you put those two facts together, it should become quite obvious that she was hit by the sword."

Yasuhiro held his chin with his hand, pressing his thumb against his cheek as he pondered this for a while. "So, when the fighting broke out," he began, his voice steady as he tried to piece each piece of the puzzle together. I was doing so as well on my own, my eyes shut tightly in deep concentration. "The culprit grabbed the sword. And that's when the first blow was dealt!"  
  
  


That did sound quite reasonable, and I was contemplating that theory also. However, as I tried to remember what the sword looked like after the fight, something was undoubtedly bothering me.

The sheath of the sword. If the blade was first used in the struggle, why was the sheath all damaged and scratched up? That part didn't make any sense at all; if the culprit were to attack Sayaka with the sword, they should have removed the sheath first before delivering the starting blow. Perhaps, they attacked her with the sheath still on?

Or maybe, that wasn't what happened at all.

"Wait," I deliberately peeled open my eyes to stare at the podium in front of me. "I don't think the fight started with the sword."

"Huh?" Yasuhiro was certainly confused by my rebuttal, as everybody else seemed to have agreed with him. "Why not?"

"Because the sword's sheath had been scratched." I explained. "If you recall what it looked like, there should be a gash in it, like someone cut into it with something sharp."

"Something sharp..." trailed Chihiro. "You mean, like the kitchen knife? That was the only sharp thing found at the scene."

"Hey, slow down, slow down!" Mondo griped, defeated and hopeless. "Someone explain it to me so I can understand what's going on."

I did so gratefully. "If the sword was used first, there wouldn't be any explanation for the scratch on the sheath," I elaborated, moving my palms as the words flowed from my lips. "If you were going to attack with the sword, you'd take the sheath off, right?"

"That's true." Mondo huffed, scratching the back of his neck in the slightest bit of embarrassment. "With the sheath on, it'd be heavy and bulky and useless as shit."

"Okay, so how _did_ the sheath get damaged?" questioned Hifumi, clearly lost in this entangled trial of sorts.

"Like Chihiro said," Kyoko's sentences were so natural, so calm, it was like she already knew exactly what happened. Unlike the rest of us, she sounded almost completely confident in her answers. "We can assume the kitchen knife was used to create the cut. If so, maybe they grabbed the sword as a defensive impulse to stop the knife from hitting them."

"And if you take Sayaka's murder plan into mind," added Byakuya, seeming to never give that subject of his up. It appeared that once he figured that out, he would have to let everybody in the room know of his intelligence. A basic act of arrogance, I thought. "Then it makes sense for the knife to strike first, as she was planning to kill the culprit."

"Hey!" Aoi yelled before he could continue any further. "How can you be so sure Sayaka's the one with the knife? I mean, I don't believe that she would actually try and attack someone with that! Maybe she was the one who used the sword as a defense!"

I didn't want to believe it either, but I quickly found a clear contradiction in her argument. It pained me so much to actually acknowledge Sayaka's betrayal, but I couldn't fear from the truth, otherwise, we would only be running in circles. I found myself grimacing when I spoke, "But Aoi, there's evidence proving she never picked up that sword once."

Aoi was thrown into utter shock when she saw me stepping over on the other side as well. "W-What? Where?"

"Her palms." I tried to steady my voice as much as possible, but even beyond my desperate attempts, I could still hear myself trembling as I resumed. "The palms of Sayaka's hands were perfectly clean. If she picked up the sword at all, there would've been paint stuck to her skin. Like I said earlier, the gold coating comes right off as soon as you touch the sword. In fact, the handle of the sword's almost picked clean because of that. The wielder of the sword must've had some glitter on their hands after they picked it up, so that's why I don't think Sayaka used the sword."

"W-Well, what if s-she just washed it off?" Toko accused, jabbing a judgmental finger towards me.

"No, that can't be it either," I was closing down rebuttals left and right, so smoothly, even I was impressed, and frankly a bit terrified, of my ability. I was surprised at how well I could remember in moments of panic and high stress. "According to the Monokuma File, Sayaka's time of death was around 1:30 a.m. In other words, at "nighttime". And the water in the bathrooms all shut off during nighttime, right, Monokuma?"

"Yes!" Monokuma sat straight up in his throne, delighted. It slightly sickened me seeing how happy he was because of my simple statement. "Finally, someone who remembers what I said! If you little kids read the note I put in each of your dorm rooms, you'd know that already!"

"Oh..." Toko's gaze fell straight to the ground in a crash. "I didn't know that. Actually...I haven't taken a shower here yet..."

"Oh my." I heard Hifumi mutter from beside me, shaking his head in utter disappointment. I winced.

"S-Shut up! Y-You're no different!" Toko yelled in defense, shrinking back to avoid looking at anybody else.

Kiyotaka wisely chose to ignore their flying, childish insults, and carried the conversation once again. "So anyway, if Sayaka never touched the sword, then that proves that the killer is the only one who used the sword."

"I-I can't believe it," Chihiro's eyes were wide in disbelief, trembling with invisible, soon to be tears. "Sayaka was truly the one who attacked first?"

"I've been saying," Byakuya's voice was compressed flat of any feelings as he spoke yet again with the slightest hint of irritancy. "I knew she was planning a murder. When you look a bit deeper into it, it's clear that she wanted to kill and frame."

"But that's such a risky plan!" Hifumi said, pushing his eyeglasses higher up his face out of trembling terror. "I'm not so sure she's dumb enough to use such a dicey murder plan. And even if it had worked, Mr. Naegi would have just told everyone they switched rooms, like what he did earlier."

Byakuya let out a rather annoyed sigh. "You don't get it? She used his softhearted behavior to manipulate and trick him into falling into her plan, and somehow believed that he wouldn't say a word. As long as it meant protecting her, Makoto wouldn't have said anything that would accuse her of such hideous crimes. That plan sounds like something higher up in her terms of intelligence, right?"

"However, her plan must've backfired, as now _she's_ the one who has been killed." Celeste stated simply, her posture straight and proper. "She found herself underneath the very knife she used to attack the assailant, which must have occurred when they broke her wrist with the sword. As a result, she was forced to drop the knife, and was killed by the culprit."

"But..." I found myself suddenly drowning in an ocean of doubt and guilt. It was so, so difficult to believe that Sayaka was capable of doing such things. After all this time I've spent with her, I had fooled myself in trusting her, thinking she was the brightest role model there was. I had no idea she was not a victim in her murder, but a killer as well. "She would never do that, would she?"

"Oh, but she did." I gritted my teeth at the sound of Byakuya's voice, full of malice and torment. "That's just how this game works, right?"

"Game?" shouted Aoi, completely infuriated at his sneers. "Is this some kind of a joke to you! Our lives are on the line, you know!"

Before he could respond with an even smugger retort, Monokuma abruptly interrupted our debate. "Hey, hey! Stop getting off topic!" He yelled, clearly enraged by our arguments. "You're being super, super boring right now! Stop going in circles talking about Sayaka and figure out who did it already!"

Leon groaned at Monokuma's impatient demands, rubbing his forehead with his fingers. "It's easy just to say, "Hey, decide who did it", but there aren't any more clues right?"

I found my eyes squeezed shut as I tried my absolute hardest to remember. I couldn't get distracted by Sayaka's treachery now. I needed to focus in on the case, or else, everybody in this room will perish. My heart slammed inside my chest as my breathing grew heavier and heavier with each panic filled second. 

Think. Think.

How many clues did we even have left? Everything was either too vague in unearthing the blackened, or irrelevant to the discovery at all. There were still far too many holes in the case, and I seemed to have run out of thread to patch it up. 

"Ugh, there's nothing we can do!" Yasuhiro bemoaned, distressed at our hopeless situation. "What other clues are there?"

What other clues?

I felt my own sweat trickle down the side of my face as I jammed my brain into work. There has to be something, I just know it. Just as I gathered all of my lingering remembrances together to search through, my dry lips cracked open to speak. 

"Wait," I started off quite hoarse as the memory suddenly came flooding back to me. Perhaps the remaining clue wasn't naturally lying on the victim's body, or the cluttered dorm room, but rather, left behind. "There still might be one clue left: Sayaka's dying message."

Leon gave me the strangest look of doubt. "Dining-wait, what did you say?"

"The dying message." said Kyoko, nodding her head along. I gave her a smile that she did not seem to notice; without her help, I wouldn't have ever remembered the significance of the bloody numbers on the wall. "She wrote something on the wall behind her, remember?"

"Huh? What did she write?" Mondo questioned. He, as well as the rest of the remaining class, was intrigued to hear what may be the most important clue of the case.

Kyoko answered rather quickly, enunciating each word so they could be heard clear. "One, one, zero, three, seven, written as Arabic numerals in her own blood. There must be a clue about the killer hidden in there."

"Just a moment," Celeste rebutted, and I flinched at the sudden ferocity of her own voice. "Can we really be sure that Sayaka was the one who wrote it? It could be the killer, trying to make a diversion."

My head was starting to ache from all the work I was forcing it to do. I had never been so pressured to recall things before, yet this was a first. Inside my mind was the bloody message, scrawled as clear as day in bright crimson. It was on the left side of Sayaka's body, hidden half behind her. If she really did write it, then...

"No, I'm almost positive she was the one who wrote it." I cleared that contradiction up with the remnants of my hazy memories. "Her left index finger had blood on it, and there was nothing in the Monokuma File that said anything about injuring her left hand at all. Plus, the message was written on the left side of her body, so she must've used the blood on her left finger to write it on the wall just beside her."

"I see..." Kiyotaka was visibly sweating with distress, seemingly uncomfortable with the horrid truth behind the murder. "She broke her right wrist during the fight, so she'd have to use her left hand to write."

Aoi appeared skeptical of our fast paced discussion, furrowing her eyebrows in deep concentration. "Okay, so we can all agree that Sayaka wrote it. But what the heck do those numbers mean? 11037?"

"Hey, Chihiro!" called Mondo from his side of the circle. "You're good with computers and shit, right? Do you know anything about these numbers?"

"Well," Chihiro dropped her gaze to meet the floor. "Yes, I'm a programmer, but I can't seem to draw any correlation between these numbers. Sorry."

"Well, that's natural." I raised my head to face Kyoko, puzzled by her surprising choice of words. My mouth opened and closed as I tried to speak, but didn't know what words to say. What did she mean by 'that's natural'? It was like she knew far more than anybody else in this courtroom, and her wit truly amazed me. Yet at the same time, I felt myself paranoid at how clever she was.

"It's because they're not numbers at all."

"Y-You're right!" Hifumi cried out in agreement. "The first two numbers, 11. Don't they look less like two numbers and more like one single letter?"

"Now that you say it," Chihiro said, her eyes blinking in realization. "They do kinda form an N! The connecting line is barely there, so I just assumed they were eleven, but it's actually N."

"But even if that really is an N," said Sakura, narrowing her own pale, icy eyes. "'N037" doesn't make any more sense than before."

I let a sharp exhale escape through my clenched teeth. She was right; even the new code was confusing. Try as I might, but I couldn't seem to decode it at all. I tried scrambling and unscrambling the digits inside my head, reversing the order, everything. Nothing popped inside my head, and I was painfully, utterly, completely stuck.

Kyoko noticed my struggle to understand the undecipherable message. "Junko, remember what I told you earlier?" I gazed up from my own wooden podium and into her deep lavender eyes. They were calm, confident, unfaltering, no matter the issue at hand. "Pretend that you're Sayaka, writing that message from where she was standing."

I dropped my head to scribble the exact numbers down on my podium seat. Immediately, eleven other students copied my movements as I tried to write that odd sequence of numbers with my left hand.

Kyoko shook her head at my futile attempts. "No, write it as is, like how it would be seen from the front."

It took some retries for me to successfully write all the letters upside down. And when I did, I realized, with the worst, purest kind of horror, exactly what it was.

"Oh my god..." I whispered, letting my left hand fall slack against the podium's surface. The rest of the class turned to face my terrified expression as I covered my mouth with both my hands in incredulity. "She-She wrote down the killer's name..."

"Huh?" exclaimed Aoi, jumping back from her seat at my urgent exclamations. "You just shot past the clue and right on to who did it!"

"So, w-whose name did sh-she write?" Toko's voice was decreasing in pace, as if she was dreading the final reveal of the culprit's identity. She was anxiously chewing on the tips of her fingernails, waiting.

"If you turn the writing 180 degrees," I felt like I was watching myself explain it all from outside my body, a mere soul listening to myself speak without a conscience. "It becomes the letters, "L-E-O-N. Or more accurately, Leon." I swallowed the thickest lump settling inside my throat, preventing myself from speaking. My voice was trembling with outright despair as I said,

"Isn't that... your name..." I lifted my gaze heavily from the ground to stare deep into the eyes of the blackened.

"Leon Kuwata?"

I felt my heart finally shatter into a million pieces as I saw him ultimately spiral into panic.

He let out a choked sputter, his eyes growing wider than I had ever seen it become. He flinched away from the rest of the circle, backing up into a corner as he broke out into a cold, desperate sweat. His lips twitched in an unreadable mixture of raw bewilderment and alarm. "W-What the hell are you talking about? I-It's just a coincidence!"

"Coincidence? I don't think so." Kyoko, the exact opposite of Leon, was steely and still, continuing to present the pieces of evidence in front of her. "As I said, if you were in Sayaka's place to write that message on the wall behind her, you can't write normally. As a result, writing a message from that position would cause the writings to be upside down if you look at it from the front."

I couldn't watch the debate any further. Leon was undoubtedly trapped in an unescapable corner here, one where he had no other choice but to fight and lose it all in the end. "Th-That sounds like one hell of a stretch to me!" He tried to defend himself by lashing out any counters he had left. "I'm the killer? You can't just go and say shit like that!"

Kyoko was resuming to chase after him, determined to let a confession slip out as she pressed the matter even harder than before. So hard, that even I felt uncomfortable at her sharp, demanding interrogations. "If you're _not_ the killer, then why did you try to destroy the evidence?"

"Wh-Wh-" Leon spluttered out. "What the hell do you mean evidence? What evidence?"

An agonizing wince of sorts freed itself from my burdening chest and out of my lips. I knew precisely what Kyoko was talking about, but I was more than reluctant to expose it. I wanted more than anything to be wrong, but all the solid clues were proving otherwise, and I was forced to accept that my classmate, my _friend_ , Leon Kuwata, was the killer.

"Go ahead, Junko." Kyoko encouraged, crossing her arms tightly over her chest as she gazed at me with such intensity in her eyes. "You seem to know the answer, right?"

Now, even if I absolutely refused to do so, I was necessitated to speak. "A-Are you talking about the missing hair in the room and scorched remains of a white button-up shirt near the incinerator? The one with the blood on it?"

It appeared to be exactly what she was looking for, as she nodded for the nth time this past hour. "The killer could have used the lint roller inside Makoto's room to get rid of any evidence that they were there, I assume. And as the killer stabbed Sayaka, they must have gotten some of her blood on them." She explained it all so smoothly, so composed, I could hardly believe she was revealing her own peer as a murderer. "And to dispose of the shirt covered in the victim's blood, they threw it into the incinerator."

"But one piece fell off and got left behind." added Celeste, her face a mask of undecipherable iron.

"The killer didn't seem to notice it either, otherwise they would have most certainly panicked," Kyoko trained her glare right onto Leon, who stood directly across from where she stood. "Isn't that right, Leon?"

He seemed to be so far into his own panic, he could not afford to form words any longer. "Wh-Wh-Wh-" He choked and coughed on his own broken sentences, further proving his guilt.

Sakura, however, seemed rather skeptical of accusing Leon for murder. "But is one scrap of fabric enough to conclude that Leon is the culprit?"

"Yeah..." Chihiro meekly agreed with the taller woman, her hands folded and fiddling together as she gave it some thought. "I mean, Leon's not the only one wearing a white button-up..."

"Th-That's right!" yelled Leon, leaping onto their defenses like a predator latching onto prey. "There are plenty of other people here with shirts like mine! You can't decide it's mine!"

I thought about the small, ripped, charred piece of fabric lying nearing the incinerator. He was certainly right: there was no way we could definitely tell who's shirt that was just from that tear. But there was something else in the trash room alongside the shirt remains. I let out the shakiest sigh of my life.

"Yeah, that alone isn't enough," I uttered, squeezing my fingers into fists to try and stop them from shaking. "But there are some other points that might lead to the truth."

"L-Like what? What else is there?" Leon challenged me with vigor and aggression sprouting from his words.

"Pay attention to _how_ it was disposed of." I began, but he didn't seem to have the remaining patience to listen to what I had to say.

"Oh, I know what you're gonna say next," he growled low in his throat, eyes alit with fury. "You can't reach the incinerator without opening the gate in front of the trash room, right? And obviously, you wouldn't be able to hit the switch to turn it on, either, cause it's so far away. The only way to dispose of anything through the incinerator is by unlocking the shutters with the key, and the one with the key was the person on cleaning duty!"

"So you're saying the killer must be the person on cleaning duty?" Celeste proclaimed, her face undisturbed yet intrigued by his argument. "That must be Hifumi, correct?"

"Wh-What? Me?" Hifumi cried out from beside me, pouring sweat as the suspicion was now placed on him. I gripped my hands on the podium in front of me and shot a glance of concern towards him. I felt my teeth sink into my lower lip as I shook my head, refusing to take that accusation into account.

No, there was no way Hifumi could have disposed of the evidence. Even though he was the one who had the key, it didn't necessarily mean he was the killer. In fact, I believe, that the key wasn't even needed to get access to the button. 

"Yeah!" Leon jabbed a quivering finger at Hifumi's direction, the pulsing tremble of his hand causing it to occasionally shift onto me. "You'd have to get close to the incinerator in order to destroy the evidence. That's why having the key is the only way you can get to the incinerator!"

There. There it was. The contradiction.

"Wait! Hold on!" It was now my turn to cut his sentence off. I snapped my body forward to make my voice heard in the midst of all the side chat. "I think I know how someone could dispose of the evidence without using the key or even getting close to the incinerator!"

"But if you can't get past the gate, you couldn't possibly turn on the incinerator, could you?" Sakura was perplexed by my odd counter, which I couldn't blame her for. It did seem nearly impossible for one to turn the incinerator on from thirty feet away, plus separated by a large gate.

However, although it was nearly impossible, it didn't mean it was fully inaccessible. There was still the smallest, slimmest chance.

"You could." I explained, digging through my cardigan pocket with my right hand. I cautiously retrieved the shattered piece of glass and held it out for everyone to see. "If you used this."

Mondo leaned forward, squinting his eyes to make out the mangled hunk of glass. "What is that? Some kind of glass ball? It's busted to hell."

"Actually," Yasuhiro grimaced with pain at the demented sight of his former accessory. "It was supposed to be a crystal ball. I think I lost it the other day while I was doing the laundry, but, uh, I guess someone broke it?"

"And how it got broken leads to how it was used to turn on the incinerator." I set the piece of crystal on the rim of my podium, letting it balance flawlessly on the wooden edge. "The killer took this ball and threw it through a gap in the gate to aim at the incinerator switch inside. That's how they managed to flick it on, even though they couldn't get past the shutters."

"Someone...threw that through a gap in the gate?" Hifumi exclaimed, unbelieving such obscurities. 

"Remember what you said before, Hifumi?" I questioned, turning to face him. "You said that you had left the machine off the last time you visited the trash room, and when we checked it out this morning, it was suddenly on."

"Strange, isn't it?" He nibbled on the tips of his fingernails, uncertain of what's to come. "Somebody must've turned it on while I was gone!"

I nodded, straightening my spine so I was standing in a mountain pose once again. "Hifumi had the key, so the only way someone could have turned it on without his knowledge, was because the killer was able to hit the switch _without_ opening the gate. After that, all they had to do was ball up the shirt and toss in as well."

Leon stumbled backwards from his podium, raising his shaking hands to cover his face. "H-Hey, come on, what the hell is this?"

"All you have to do is look at the scene to know that the killer never actually went inside the trash room," Kyoko added, brushing a fallen strand from her long bangs back. "If the killer had been on cleaning duty, they would've cleaned things up such as the broken shards of glass and the piece of shirt that escaped the fire, and they would've turned the incinerator off."

"No, wait, hold on!" Leon's yells of anguish were ignored by the rest of us, and I felt a pang of guilt for being so determined in the first place. Without an actual, physical blackened, the whole trial was easier to work through. But as soon as we began to see the consequences, I felt regret seep into my bones for having been so keen on figuring out the crime. Because of my blind integrity, someone else had to suffer a fate worse than death.

Chihiro tilted her head to one side as she said, "But the distance from the gate to the incinerator has to be at least...thirty feet, right? The pinpoint accuracy you'd need to throw a glass ball that far and hit something that small...could someone really do that?"

Leon's conscience was scrambling around inside his mind as he hastily supported her statement without any hesitation. "Th-That's right! There's no way! It'd be impossible!"

"Yes, it'd be impossible for a normal person to have done it," I said warily. "But in this case, it's certainly possible, if the killer was the Ultimate Baseball Star. That's your talent, isn't it, Leon?"

His stance wavered, whether from panic or rage, I could not tell. His words, however, were a mixture of both. "D-Do you have any idea how stupid you sound right now?" He yelled, his voice growing hoarse and raspy with temper. "I'm not the fucking killer! You're all out of your damn minds!"

"But you are the only one who could possibly hit a target from thirty feet away," Celeste shot him a questioning stare. "Surely, it would be little challenge for your Ultimate skills."

"Y-Y-You c-can't," Leon couldn't seem to speak a single word. "You can't be serious!"

"Like what Yasuhiro said, he most likely forgot his crystal ball in the laundry room," I said, staring down at the shattered hunk of glass that cautiously balanced itself in front of me. It seemed to wobble and trip with the growing intensity of the room, and I was preparing myself for the moment it hit the ground. "You went there to try and wash the blood from your shirt, and that's where you saw it, right? Seeing the ball, you thought of a way to dispose of everything."

Leon was completely speechless, trying to force his words out, but ultimately failing as they tumbled out as choked sputters. His fist was clenched so hard, I saw that his nails had dug deep gashes into his palms. His eyes, wide with a crude mixture of horror, infuriation, and desperation, trembled alongside his body as he remained in silence.

"Well, Leon?" Kyoko demanded, keeping her arms firmly crossed as she glared him down to the floor. "Do you have any more rebuttals up your sleeve?"

His shoulders shook uncontrollably in a wordless fit of rage that consumed him. He refused to raise his gaze from the ground, making an effort to not meet anybody's eyes. Slowly, he uttered, "Do I...have any rebuttals?"

Three seconds of dead silence felt like three aging eternities before he abruptly began to shout once more.

His body lurched forward as he slammed both of his hands against his wooden plank, creating the loudest clap of sound I had ever heard in my life. Some students, including myself, flinched instantly from his sudden aggression. "I sure do! I've got plenty! Plenty of rebuttals!" He screamed from the bottom of his throat, his voice raspy and shrill against my ears. "I mean, all of this is just a bunch of stupid theories! You need evidence! Where's the evidence?"

"Well then," Kyoko stated, keeping her cool admirably. "I guess this is as good a time as any to present the evidence that proves you did it."

"Oh yeah?" He continued to yell in a red faced anger. "Don't fucking make stuff up!"

"When the killer broke the doorknob, they took apart the screws, right?" Kyoko went on to explain, but was quickly cut off by Leon's unintelligible screaming.

"Who the hell cares about that?" He shrieked. "This is so fucking stupid! Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid!"

Kyoko let out a deep sigh from inside her chest before giving me a defeated look. "He won't listen to anything I have to say," she admitted. "How about you explain it to him, Junko?"

Me?

I could feel my heart race a million miles an hour as I forced myself to face Leon.

"The culprit took the screws in the doorknob," I tried to begin somewhere by picking up what Kyoko had said before. "But what did they use to do so?"

"Shut up!" His screams drowned out my counterarguments completely, causing me to wince at his harsh outbursts. "Shut your shitty, stupid mouth and stop talking!"

I had to resist somehow. It wholly pained me, spiritually, physically, emotionally, to push my friend being into such a narrow corner. I wanted to run away from it all and refuse to acknowledge that he, Leon Kuwata, was truly a killer. But there was nowhere to run to, and I was forced to turn against him, even though it hurt.

I opened my mouth to continue speaking, but found myself talking in such a meek voice. "According to my investigation, the killer didn't use anything from Makoto's room, since everything was left untouched," I shoved out all of my remaining thoughts so quickly, even I couldn't understand what I was saying. "They must've used a screwdriver from their own toolkit that they received from Monokuma!"

"Are you kidding me?" Leon barked, leaning forward to amplify his voice further. "That's so stupid! Stupidstupidstupidstupidstupid! How can you be so fucking sure of yourself?"

"There isn't anywhere else in the school where you can find tools like that," I felt as if I were dueling with him one on one, countering his attacks yet refusing to directly strike on my own. "And the killer didn't know there even was a toolkit inside the room, because they thought it was Sayaka's room. Only the boys have toolkits in their dorms, so they assumed it wasn't there. They most definitely used their own."

"Stupidstupidstupidstupidstupid!" Everything I tried to say seemed to go in one ear and out the other for Leon, as he still rejected all proofs shown. "There's no proof! No evidence! Without evidence, this whole trial's just a fucking sham!"

"Fine, then!" I raised my voice into an exasperated yell, causing silence to ripple all across the courtyard. "Leon, would you mind showing us your toolkit?"

"Stupidstupidstu-" His voice faltered and trailed off into a tone much weaker than before. "...Huh?"

"If I'm right about this," I swallowed thickly, allowing myself to be more clearly heard. "Then the screwdriver inside your toolkit will show some evidence of being used."

"And if you say you used it for something else," Byakuya added when he saw no answer from Leon. "You'll have to explain exactly when, where, and why."

"And let me say this right now," Kyoko chimed in, standing almost perfectly still in solemnity. "'I lost it" isn't an excuse at this point."

Leon's jaw opened and closed many times, but nothing came spilling out. Nothing of coherence, anyway. All I heard were strained noises forced from his parched throat as he stood motionless, his face drenched in an emotion I can't describe. His face was utterly pale, as if all of his energy had run out dry. Not even his sweat continued to drip from the side of his face; it was like he was in shock, unable to move or speak or even think. The only sensation of movement I saw was the slight tremble of his fist.

"Stu...pid?"

Byakuya smirked at his frozen state of panic. "So, you have no rebuttal?"

There was no reply.

Celeste sighed and began to twirl a strand of long, black hair around her finger. "Then it would seem that we are finished here."

I could not afford to look any further. The blend of immense pain and betrayal and disbelief I felt was overwhelming, too overwhelming, it seemed. It was something I could not explain in words, as the misery that ran through my body was too, too much for me to handle. I felt like collapsing right on the court's floor, wanting to do anything to stop the hurt. 

It seemed so easy to just say, "find the killer". But when that killer has a name, a face, that you are familiar with, the true reality crushes you that much harder. I didn't want it to just end like this. There was no satisfaction awarded for unsolving this murder, only treachery and despair. 

But it appeared there was nothing left to discuss of this case.

Monokuma, across from my podium, high up in his throne, began to giggle. "Looks like you've reached your verdict!" He exclaimed with such sickening giddiness. Was he really that insensitive? "Then, are we ready to cast our votes?"

I couldn't find the strength to respond.

"You all have a lever in front of you." Monokuma explained gleefully, throwing his monochrome paws into the air with delight. "Use it to make your selection! And make triple sure that you do! You don't want to be punished for not voting, right?"

The levers etched into the wooden podium demanded me to cast my vote, even though every inch of my conscience screamed at me to defend Leon. I knew that deep within me, I didn't want to sacrifice my own life, along with everybody else's, if it meant letting him live. It was such a guilty, selfish, disgusting thought, but I could do nothing to prevent it from plaguing my body, driving my arm to yank my lever.

"Who will be chosen as the blackened?" Monokuma sounded as if he was doing a voiceover, making his tone deeply dramatic and suspenseful. "Will you make the right choice, or the dreadfully wrong one?"

I voted Leon Kuwata, the Ultimate Baseball Star, as the blackened.

"What's it gonna be?" Monokuma hyped up as one by one, everybody in the courtroom began to make their decision. "What's it gonna be?"

I squeezed my eyes shut, dreading the final moments of this first Class Trial.

My heart almost broke through my bone as each painful second leisurely ticked by. I didn't even know I was holding my breath in until I almost passed out due to a lack of oxygen. 

"Uh oh!" called Monokuma from his high up throne. "Looks like you got it right on the money! Sayaka Maizono was killed by Leon Kuwata! Good job, everyone!"

"H-Huh?" Leon stuttered out, slowly backing from his stand. "W-Wait! Hold on a second, I-" He never got to finish that sentence, as he suddenly fell silent for reasons still unknown.

"Leon..." I refused to make eye contact with him. I was too much a coward to see the raw, inhumane fear that shone from his wide eyes. "Did you really...kill Sayaka?"

Aoi gasped, covering her mouth with both of her hands. "I don't believe it..."

And neither did I. Leon Kuwata, the Ultimate Baseball Star, who was the most down to Earth Ultimate there ever was, who was friendly and hilarious and enlightening at the same time, who had real passions and flaws and beauties, was a killer? I couldn't believe that he did such a thing. Never did I ever look at him and assume he was capable of murdering a friend. Never.

How?

I wanted to talk myself out of it. I wanted to make a mistake, I wanted to be wrong. But Monokuma had unfalteringly declared Leon as the true blackened, and I found myself near tears as the truth finally sank onto me, smashing my soul and destroying my mind.

"Son of a bitch!" Mondo yelled, slamming a closed fist harshly against his own podium. "What the hell is wrong with you?"

"I-I didn't have a choice," Leon's voice was trembling with outright fear. It seemed as if he was even afraid of himself, afraid of what he had done. "I mean...I nearly got killed myself." He swallowed down all his emotions, only to find them swelling up again. "S-So that's why...I killed her first."

"But why?" Chihiro stammered, her tone soft and scared. "Why did you have to-"

"None of you are any different!" He exploded from the pent up rage building inside him, lashing out at anyone who dared come near. "One wrong step, and you'd be the one standing here! I was just...unlucky, that's all."

Nobody had a response for that.

The truth had finally become crystal clear. We made the most difficult choice, yet it was the right one after all. It almost seemed that being wrong would've been a more painless act than choosing correctly, as I doubted death would cause me to suffer more than betrayal. 

Treachery after treachery slapped me across the face without giving me time to react. Sayaka's attempt to frame her best friend, Leon's murderous deeds, it was all so bewildering, that I couldn't possibly see it as the reality. But it was all indeed true. Sayaka's desire to escape the school led to not one, not two, but alas three deaths of our friends. 

Those videos. It all started because of those goddamn videos.

The mastermind was undoubtedly clever, I had to admit. They knew all of our weak points, struck there the hardest, and made us all crack. The staggering pressure and terror must've gotten to Sayaka successfully, as now, she was dead because of her desperate attempts. Not only her, but her death caused both Makoto, and soon to be Leon, to be brutally murdered.

I hated it. I hated how fragile our life was in the hands of the mastermind. I hated how easily we died here.

Was this how true despair felt?

"Now then!" Monokuma forced us from our grief stricken silence with a cheerful call. "Since you so magnificently revealed the identity of the killer during the class trial, the blackened, Leon Kuwata, will receive his punishment!"

Leon staggered back, almost tripping over his own feet in his rush of absolute fear. "P-Punishment?" He croaked out, eyes wide and trembling. "You mean...e-execution?"

Monokuma let out a deep, disappointing sigh. "Yes, I mean execution! Have you not been listening to the rules?"

"W-Wait a second!" Leon fell forward against his podium, clumsily catching himself before he could crumble. "I was forced to kill her! Y-Yeah, that's it! I was just protecting myself in the heat of the moment!" He let out a crackling, nervous laughter that received no reciprocal. "It was self defense! Don't I have a case for that?"

"Self defense?" Celeste leaned forward to stare unnervingly deep into his startled blue eyes. "How, exactly, was it self defense? When you forced your way into the bathroom, did you or did you not use a screwdriver from your very own toolkit?"

Leon appeared rather stunned by her attack, his face screaming of alarm. "I-I-"

"After she'd shut herself in the bathroom," Celeste cut him off with her accusation, talking right over his poor defenses. "You went out of your way to head back to your room. Then, you came all the way back, broke into the bathroom, and killed her. Am I wrong?"

"But-"

"You had a number of chances to stop what you were doing," continued Celeste. She did not leave him any chance to speak for himself. "But you chose not to. Was it because you had an unclouded intent for murder?"

Leon's hands flew free from their grip on the podium. "N-No! That's not..."

"Just stop." I heard myself whisper. Although my voice was soft and raspy, it seemed to still catch the attention of the whole room, as everybody suddenly fell silent once again. "Stop. I'm so tired of it all."

Celeste raised her hand to her mouth as she spoke with surprise, "Oh! But are you not upset by the fact that your friend was killed by Leon?"

"I...I don't blame Leon," I began with shaky discourage in my own words. "And I don't blame Sayaka either. If she had never seen those videos that she was forced to watch, I-I don't think she would've done what she did." I raised my head from my position to glare through a film of rage at Monokuma, who sat amused from his chair. I pointed a finger of accusation towards the bear and began to yell, "It's all his fault! If it weren't for you, this would've never happened to Sayaka, _or_ Leon! You made those stupid videos to encourage us to murder each other, right? How sick can you get?"

"Oh, so you're blaming me now?" Monokuma tipped his head innocently to the side. "You know, it's not like you have to kill in order to stay alive. I just gave you a motive, and you guys just started killing each other! It was their choice to start fighting, after all." 

"We shouldn't be fighting one another," my hand fell slack against the surface of my podium, causing the hunk of glass to wobble violently from side to side. "We should be fighting the one who put us in this situation! The mastermind!"

"So _now_ you wanna play good guy?" Monokuma taunted, his voice dripping false, harsh venom. "Say what you want, but you can't cover the truth: all those people who have perished, Sayaka, Makoto, Leon, whatever, all suffered their fates due to their own desires! I didn't force them to do anything, yet they still are so, so selfish. It's amazing how much despair someone's hope can bring."

When he sighed out of content, I had enough. "Just shut up!"

"Okay, well, anyway," Monokuma chose to ignore my shouts and waved a dismissive paw in the air. "More importantly, let's hurry up and get to what everyone's been waiting for! The punishment!"

"N-No, wait, stop!" Leon screamed from where he stood, his voice breaking out of his own fear and desperation. "I'm begging you! Please, don't do this!"

"No more begging!" Monokuma growled from deep inside her throat, his left eye glowing a deathly crimson. "Excuses don't work here! Disrupt law and order, and you get punished for it. That's just how it works, sorry!"

"S-Stop!" shrieked Leon, tears beginning to well in his eyes. The pain, the terror, the panic that pulsed through him was so overpowering, everyone in the room could feel it too. "Please!"

Despite his frantic pleas of anguish, Monokuma showed no signs of any remorse, and even began to cackle out his giggles. I gritted my teeth so hard, I could feel my jaw ache from the pressure. He was inhumane, with no morals or sympathy, or any human emotion.

"Now, then! I've prepared a very special punishment for Leon Kuwata, the Ultimate Baseball Star!" howled Monokuma in a wild fit of his own laughter, like it was an entertainment show for him to indulge in.

"No...no..." Leon started to back up, his legs trembling from outright horror of what's to come. He threw himself against the navy patterned walls of the courtroom, screaming his entire life out in those incoherent wails of pure despair. "No! Let me out of here!"

Everybody stood frozen to their seats, watching behind wide, frightful eyes as he begged for his life and scratched fruitlessly against the walls, tearing the soft wallpaper in his desperation. His screaming never seemed to cease inside my ears, piercing my mind with its shrillness until I couldn't afford to watch any longer.

Monokuma didn't pause his laughter once, giggling until he lost his breath. "Let's give it everything we've got! It's punishment time!"

And he pressed the red button.

游戏结束.

There stood a boy with red hair.

Surrounding him were his classmates, blurry by his teary sight of vision, watching through concerned intent as the metal chain dangling from the ceiling crept closer, and closer, and even closer. At last, the icy steel collar squeezed itself around his throat, choking his windpipe, and hazing the corners of his consciousness.

The chain began to pull, yanking his body in an abrupt backwards motion, and stealing him away from the rest of his life. A hand from the boy weakly reached out to nobody before he was dragged away, his legs viciously scratching and bumping the solid tiled floors. In he went into a long, isolated corridor that snapped close as soon as he entered, the red lights hanging above the opening blaring the words, "in use'.

The lengthy metal chain towed him through the never ending hallway of darkness, scratching and bruising his body as he vigorously was pulled away. The light at the end of the corridor grew dimmer and dimmer, smaller and smaller, until it faded away to a night so black, it drowned the boy in his own thoughts of despair.

The hallway fed into an enclosed room with filthy, rotting iron walls that proved themselves to be soundproof, as his cries of alarm failed to reach out to anybody. The dizzying lights of luster blinded his eyes for a brief moment when the chain fastened his limp, broken body to a sturdy pole in the midst of a baseball training net. He found that he could not move inside his restraints, and was forced to hang still from the pole as the metal chain link fences snapped shut in front of him.

Now adjusting his vision to the vivid stadium lights that fixated on him, the boy's eyes darted up to stare at the cluttered machine that laid a few dozen feet away. 

The weapon in question somewhat resembled a Gatling gun, long, sleek, rusted with age. Its barrel aimed straight for the boy, its gaze deafening and horrifying to any and all who dared to step in front of it. One after the other, numberless baseballs began to file into the machine, clinking noisily against each other as they piled inside the tank. It was unmistakably the ammunition for this huge, menacing gun.

Standing fearfully on the other side of the metal chain fence were the rest of his class, watching as the machine roared and growled to life. The muzzle spun around and around in violent circles as dust blew from the sides. Cacophonously, the gun began to start up, jolting into action as the monochrome bear directed it to take an aim.

A single, pure white baseball freed itself from the gaping mouth of the gun, falling against the boy's abdomen with a dull thud before dropping to the ground. As it began to roll to the sidelines, more and more identical balls soon followed its path, striking him over and over and over again. With each shot, the intensity and pace of the launch grew higher, and before long, the boy was drowned in a pelting rain of solid projectiles.

Around and around and around it went in circles, crushing what was left of his body, even long after it had been utterly broken. Smashing into his skull, shattering his ribcage, splintering his legs. Blood splashed from the gaping wounds, falling onto the hard, dry cement floor, staining it a sickening crimson. The sound of bones being smashed were almost completely drowned out by the growl of the machine, continuing to beat the boy one ball after the other. It could've been almost a thousand, enough to kill even the strongest man alive.

Each baseball that struck his body was instantly tainted red from the blood that continued to gush from his injuries. The machine did not stop even once for mercy, resuming to launch the ammunition at the disfigured, demented figure of what used to be a high school boy. He coughed once, the blood splattering against the metal fence that separated him and his classmates, before the baseballs completely drowned him in a wave of unexplainable pain.

The machine sputtered and choked as it began to finally dwindle down on the number of balls. Sighing out a cloud of hazy smoke, it sank back into its haunches and relaxed its muscles. The muzzle gradually halted its spin until it came to a complete stop, leaving the air into a ghostly silence that could not be broken, even by the students worn down by fear. The alert lights that once shone red melted into a vibrant blue, signifying the safety of the war-zone as the gate piercingly slid open. The iron joints of the fence creaked and groaned its last breaths, revealing the bloody, gruesome remains of the punishment.

The boy, still hanging from the pole, draped in rusted chains, stopped moving and never did ever again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> long chapter im sorry


	5. Chapter Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The scent of death still lingers in the air.

Monokuma said he would get rid of the corpses, but he never erased our latching mourning.

All in one day, three people, three of my classmates, had been brutally killed at the hands of the mastermind. Although their corpses were now disposed of, the sight of their gruesome demise etched itself deep into my brain, making sure I never once forgot. I mean, how could I ever forget their bloodied, lifeless bodies, which had once held the soul of my dear friends?

During the hopeless elevator ride up, I could still hear the empty sound of a thousand baseballs crushing the remains of Leon's hung body. When we drearily passed the gymnasium entrance on our way back into the academy, I could still feel the ripple of hundreds of bullets slicing through the thick air. And while we finally arrived at our respective dorm rooms, I could still see the blood splattered, sickening sight of Sayaka's dead body.

Everywhere I went, their deaths would quickly follow, taunting and whispering to me at each opportunity they got, making sure I never forget.

Even in my dreams, it seemed, I would still see their corpses, lying on the ground in front of me, their blood splashing onto my hands. No matter where I tried to run to, they would always find a way to appear again, haunting my soul for eons at a time. Nothing I tried ever aided me in escape. 

That night, I dreamt of blood and gore and screams.

So when I reluctantly woke up the next morning, I felt the worst I ever did in a while. My head was spinning and aching with the sharp images of death. My neck and shoulders were stiff from a pain caused by laying in the wrong position. My ears were ringing, why, I did not know, although I had a guess it was because of Monokuma's disgustingly fake voice blaring from the speakers. The inside of my mouth tasted raw and coppery, and it took me a second to realize it was my own blood, drawn up by my teeth piercing through the inner flesh of my cheek. Every inch of my body was numb and sore, and with each attempt at movement, I was greeted with another wave of fresh pain. 

I decided to lay still in my bed, completely and utterly exhausted by the previous day, and waited for my bones to build their strength. Unconsciousness crept behind me, lassoing me in and threatening to make me fall asleep again. I slowly blinked away my sleep, trying to force my mind into reality once again. Before long, I found myself awake.

I so badly wanted to just fall asleep and forget about everything that has happened, but I knew deep down, that I needed to arise someday. Instead of dodging and trying to escape the obvious issue at hand, I needed to face it, as surviving the worst would be the only thing that would make me stronger. So I ultimately dragged myself off of the soft, warm bed, and gazed into the mirror.

I certainly looked like a corpse myself. My eyes were still puffy with sleep, squinted from the bright, unfamiliar light that filtered into my retinas. My hair, which I had barely remembered to let loose for the night, was a mangled, disorderly mess, growing almost twice in volume than it originally was. There were deep, dark circles beneath my eyes, most likely caused by my insomnia while trying to dream. My skin was ashen, dehydrated, ghastly pale. And to top it all off, a smear of blood was dragged across my lips, and I harshly rubbed it off with the side of my palm. I sighed.

It was going to be a long day.

Grimacing, I got dressed with rather difficulty; I could not stop my mind from racing from one topic to another, and it all hurt my head all that much. I found it near impossible to focus, and after I had struggled to put on my usual outfit for the day, I stepped in front of the mirror once again. I cringed at once.

Everything looked so out of place, from my crooked white tie, to my scrunched ruby bow, to my crumpled plaid skirt. It was an atrocious sight indeed; I hardly believed I had put myself together like this. Usually, I would spend minutes, sometimes even hours of my morning to perfect my outfit. But now, I no longer felt the necessary, heart-pounding rush to make myself appear flawless. I simply had no more energy left inside my body to correct everything, and with a deepest sigh, I reached for my hairbands lying on the nightstand's surface.

As I did, however, I noticed something quite odd.

I never saw it before inside my room, however, it fit right in with the rest of my excessive hair accessories. There, lying supremely on my desktop, was a small pink hairbrush.

My fingers forgot all about my rubber bands as the colorful ties slipped from my grasp. I instead retrieved the brush, gingerly picking it off the table and setting it inside my palms. I brought it closer to my face for a better inspection of the object.

The hairbrush was painted a glossy hot pink, the vibrant color sticking out from the rest of my dull, dreary room. The bristles were absolutely clean, devoid of any stray hairs or collecting dust. There was no logo printed on the handle, but I could only assume where it came from: Monokuma.

Who else would have a brand new, untouched hairbrush other than the mastermind themself? Nobody here could have access to the outside world, and everything we brought with us was confiscated the minute we arrived here. Plus, no one could open my dorm room other than myself, unless it was Monokuma. I was not certain if he owned a key that opened all the doors in the school, but judging from his clear, dominating power already showcased before, I safely presumed it was true.

I have no feelings of any sort likeliness towards Monokuma, as he had no mercy or sanity whatsoever, but I was quite thankful for receiving a brush. After these past four days, my hair had grown into an unruly, matted nest, that not even I could tame. I instantly began to run the bristles through my thick, snarled hair, wincing when I felt the comb halt at certain knots.

It took me several failed attempts, a lot of frustration, and an extended amount of time to finally free my hair of any tangles. When I finally could comb through my hair neatly with even my fingers, I sighed out in pure relief. I would never say to his face, but I did owe Monokuma one this time around. 

Now that my hair was back to its original silkiness, I found little effort in hoisting and tying my hair up into two, overflowing pigtails. I brushed the twin ponytails back so that they fell behind my shoulders, and felt the cool air of my dorm room lash at my bare neck. Shivering ever so slightly, I outstretched my arm to reach for the two hair clips lying discarded beside the brush. I slid the bunny brooch onto my right pigtail, and the red and white bowtie to my left. 

My mood must've been somewhat lifted after receiving the gift, because my hair was the neatest part of my entire outfit that day.

I suddenly became aware of the time I've spent polishing up for the morning. It took me what felt like five entire minutes to comb through my voluminous hair, and surely, I would be held back for a bit for our daily breakfast meeting. Running my fingers through my hair one last time, I hurried out of my room.

Just as I had expected, the dorm halls were empty went I stepped out into the corridor, icy, vast, forlorn. I assumed everybody else was already sitting in the dining hall, possibly waiting for the last few students to arrive and gather, so I rushed my pace a bit more. My footsteps were noisy and unrhythmic as I tried my best to jog over to the dining hall.

As I ran, I felt the sluggish weight of overdue sleep drag me down, causing a few yawns to escape occasionally from my lips and hefty footsteps as my boots slapped across the tile floor. My body was certainly not prepared for running yet, but I forced myself to continue pacing anyways in order to catch up with the rest of my classmates. I pushed myself into the dining hall, and immediately winced at the brilliant overhead lights that attacked my eyes. 

Even my ears felt pain as I heard Kiyotaka announce, "Miss Enoshima! What's your excuse this time?"

I couldn't find the energy or bother to reply, so I halfheartedly slid into my usual seat without a pretext to counter his accusation.

Fortunately for me, Mondo had responded in my place, leaning his chair back in annoyance. "Jeez, it's obvious that she's tired from yesterday. Aren't we all?"

He was right. The events from the day before were so mind boggling, so extreme, so unbelievable, that I found them constantly occupying my mind. Our class suddenly grew three students short, and I was reminded of that when I coincidentally gazed at the empty chairs of the now deceased. Letting out a sigh, I forced myself to look away and swallow any remaining words I had left.

"A lot happened yesterday," agreed Aoi, appearing quite reluctant as she stared at the table in front of her. "But," she lifted her gaze and the look in her eyes transformed into one of hope. "We can't be depressed forever over that. If we all work together, I'm sure we'll find a way out of here! So everyone, just try and cheer up and get back on track!"

From his seat far away from the rest of us, Byakuya scoffed, rolling his eyes. "Is that honestly supposed to make us feel better?"

Aoi flinched away, a look of surprise adorning her face. "H-Huh?"

Byakuya sighed abruptly, seemingly irritated at our naive courage. "We were already "working together", and yet someone was still murdered. Anyone could betray us at this point. Now that it's happened once, it's a question of when, not if, the next one takes place."

Toko, who was standing hunched beside him, forced out with menace, "Yeah, because S-Sayaka made the first move..."

Aoi's eyebrows creased in concern at the sound of those negative words. "B-But...if we work together against the mastermind, nobody'll have any reason to do something like that!"

"Keep telling yourself that," Byakuya snarled as a retort. "I'll be over here in the real world."

"What are you even saying?" Yasuhiro doubted, his tone hesitant and perplexed.

"Working together, fighting a common enemy," scorned Byakuya, his voice full of thorns. "Like it or not, it's not that simple. What can we really do together in a situation like this? It's one for all and all for one: it's every man for himself at this point."

"I doubt that we can fight against the mastermind, even as a team," Celeste pitched in with a light, unworried sigh. "They seem to be much more powerful than we ever suspected. They took over Hope's Peak, which was supposed to be well defended, then modified it to fit their desire. They created Monokuma, which seems to be incredibly advanced, and they're providing for our every need. The cherry on top is the execution we witnessed." She let go of the strand of hair she had been previously twirling around her finger. "Everything has been planned down to the last excruciating detail."

"That's...not the work of an everyday psychopath." I agreed with uncertainty. Whoever was behind this whole "killing school life" wasn't an ordinary, mentally insane criminal spotted on TV. They had far too much power, too much menace, it was as if they specifically had a personal vendetta towards us. But what adult would swear vengeance on a group of high school students who've never even met before?

Celeste nodded fairly at my comment. "Defying them may be too great of a risk."

"Then..." Sakura said from her end of the table. "What are we supposed to do?"

"Anyone who truly does want to escape," stated Byakuya, crossing his arms as he shot us down with a deathly glare. "Will just have to follow the rules. In which case, the only option is to deceive those around you, and win the game."

The class was left in an uncomfortable silence at his words. We couldn't possibly agree, but we couldn't argue with it either. There was no more options left for us to escape, and the only way out was the rules. Try as we might, but we could never break through an iron plate, or discover an exit, or even fight against the mastermind. It was all simply impossible.

But one small, meek voice dared to disagree with Byakuya. "N-No..."

I lifted my head, heavy with my own thoughts, to glance right in Chihiro's direction.

"No what?" Byakuya snapped with venomous agitation lacing his statement.

"I don't want to live...if it means killing someone else to do it." She continued, her tone shaky with held back emotions. "I don't want to kill anyone else!"

"Anyone...else?" questioned Yasuhiro, scratching the back of his nape. "What do you mean?"

"Leon died because we all voted for him, right?" Chihiro stumbled over her own words as she tried to force them out. "It's no different from us killing him ourselves!"

"But..." Aoi's voice died off into a quieter tone. "If we hadn't voted for him, then we all would've died instead, right? That isn't what you wanted, is it?"

Hifumi let out a sigh of defeat as he shook his head. "She's right. If you heap that kind of blame on yourself, you'll turn into a full-fledged masochist."

Chihiro had no more words left to rebut their statements. Instead, she lingered in silence, letting their statements fade out into the air as she sat still with tears in her eyes. I found myself frowning and pushing back a fallen strand of hair behind my ear before leaning forward to meet her.

"Chihiro, listen..." I began in a tone softer than intended. "You're not to blame. Not you, not Leon, and not Sayaka. It's the mastermind who's responsible for everything that's happened."

"The...mastermind?" Chihiro echoed in a dim, shaky voice.

I nodded in confirmation. "The mastermind is who put us all in this situation in the first place, right? They're the one who trapped us here and forced us to kill each other. We had no choice but to vote. I..." My voice trailed off as well as the worst possible thoughts sank into my head. "I can't even imagine what would've happened to us if we'd refused..."

"We would've been executed, just like Leon." Sakura said with a shake of her head.

"Yeah, exactly," I continued, more and more strength returning to my speech. "And in the end, it was Monokuma who ultimately killed Leon. So, don't waste your anger on yourself. Instead, direct it at the mastermind."

If she even did have a response to that, Chihiro couldn't say anything further, because as if on cue, the tune began to play, cutting me right off.

Four cheery notes, in descending pitch order. The highest note came first, quickly followed by the second, the third, and finally, the fourth. On the last note, the bell echoed and bounced off the air, spreading the bright tune to every corner of the school.

There was a monitor inside every room in the building, all the same pale neon to yellow color. The dining hall was no exception, as the gadget hanging just above our heads began to rumble and groan as the screen flickered to life. The Hope's Peak Academy logo flashed for a split second, accompanied by the identical, glitchy footage of Monokuma in the security room, a glass of red wine dangling from his paw. He sat cross legged on an office chair, and supported his head with his free hand.

Monokuma coughed into the microphone, as if he were testing it out. "Ahem, ahem. Students of Hope's Peak Academy, your headmaster has an announcement to make!"

Several people, including myself, flinched back in surprise at the sudden sound of his voice. My chair nearly tipped back, and I groped the edges of the dining table to stabilize myself properly, my heart leaping to my throat.

"M-Monokuma?" cried out Yasuhiro, lifting his arms to defend himself.

"Shush! He's probably gonna say something important!" Aoi hissed out a whisper of demand.

"Every time you overcome a class trial here at Hope's Peak, a whole new world will open up to you!" Monokuma continued to preach with much enthusiasm. The skinny glass of wine in his left hand wobbled and tipped around as he made eager circles with his wrist, the liquid daring to spill out. 

"A...whole new world?" repeated Hifumi, blinking vigorously in confusion. I, too, was perplexed by Monokuma's odd choice of words. What did he mean by "a whole new world"? We were, at most, confined to this campus, so what could there really be to offer?

"Y'know, it be super boring if you had to live here with nothing new to stimulate you!" He resumed to explain, dragging out the word "super" for longer than necessary. "I know I would! And you kids especially, with your impatient, young, whiny generation. So go ahead, look around all you want! Enjoy the brave new post-trial world to your extent!"

The monitor screen snapped to a shut before fading once again to black.

"What does that mean? "A whole new world"?" I voiced my wonders out loud, unaware that I had even begun speaking until someone responded to my question.

"Is he talking about a way to get outside?" Aoi pondered with excitement, her fist meeting her open palm as a keen smile formed on her lips.

Celeste forcibly disagreed. "That seems...unlikely." 

"Well, we don't know 'till we look!" shouted Mondo, arising noisily from his seat. I did not know whether he was eager or irritated by Monokuma's newest announcement.

"Whatever he meant," Sakura pitched in. "It seems we'll have to search the school one more time."

Kiyotaka, being the leader he was, jumped and latched onto that idea immediately. He stood up, the back of his knees bumping into the edge of his chair and pushing it backwards. "Okay, then! Let's split up and start investigating! When you're done, everyone meet back up here and we'll share what we found!"

That sounded fairly similar to what we did on the first day here at Hope's Peak. Search the school in small groups, then report back as a team. 

"Again with this teamwork thing?" Byakuya filed a complaint from his seat a few feet away.

"Yes! Now, let's go and search!" Kiyotaka demanded, pointing an index finger at the dining hall's exit.

At his command, we all fled from our chairs and pushed out of the room, craving fresh knowledge about our new home.

It seemed unlike last time, when everyone paired together, we all went on our own individual paths to begin our search. There were many halls, many classrooms to be explored, that it couldn't possibly all be investigated if we were all in one group. I detached myself from the rest of the class to slip out into the corridor.

I did not know the slightest about where I was headed, and instead let my own feet carry me wherever. It seemed that everybody else had ran off to a place I was unknown to, and I had unconsciously wandered away from the crowd. Finding myself alone once more, I felt the hairs on my arms raise and still from the chilly air. My heart pounded inside my chest, anticipating the worst to happen as I paced in circles on the first floor, unaware of what to search for.

What did Monokuma mean by "a whole new world"? Surely, he didn't mean an exit of sorts, did he? Knowing Monokuma, he would never give us that much of hope and sincerity. I was forced to acknowledge that the only way out there was currently was to murder and get by without getting caught by anyone else. It was the worst case scenario, and the only one as well.

We had already seen a failed attempt at escape the day prior. There may be many more people desiring freedom, just like Sayaka, who wouldn't wait for the next killing to begin without their contribution. Just as Byakuya said, it wasn't a matter of if, rather when, the next murder would happen. At that thought, I felt myself tense and turn the corner with increased worries.

What greeted me instantly were the gymnasium doors, closed shut and unopened for the day. With only a mere glance at the foyer, I was abruptly reminded of the inhumane, vile tragedy that occurred just beyond those doors. The deafening, repulsive sound of a thousand bullets meeting flesh began to replay inside my ears once again, and echoed inside my head in a complete cacophony. 

With as much strength as I could muster, I forced myself to peel my gaze off of the gymnasium, reminding myself to ignore those thoughts from conquering my mind. Instead, I shoved my sight onto the stairwell that branched off into the distance that laid a few paces away from the gym foyer.

Now, I had seen this particular stairwell many times before, when I had been investigating the school and passing the gym in the previous days. However, there was one heart stopping, dizzying, noticeable difference now.

The gate that had once been blocking the stairs to the second floor had been opened.

Many thoughts swirled inside my head at once at the new sight. Was this what Monokuma meant by a new world? Did this mean we could now inhabit the second floor? Were there any clues up there at all? What new rooms would lie up on the floor above? I couldn't even concentrate on one ponder as I ultimately lifted myself to mount the stairs, a mix of trepidation and excitement churning inside my stomach as I climbed higher and higher. 

By the time I arrived at the dim, soft blue lit hallways, I was running out of breath.

The floors were hard, smooth, and reflective, identical to the ones on the first floor. There were tall, dark navy pillars line against the wall that stretched up and met as arches hanging overhead. The whole corridor was a shade of ghostly neon blue, the soft, glowing lights radiating an aqua tint that engulfed the hall. Beyond, the hallway fed into a pink hued corridor that branched off and housed an assortment of different rooms.

To my left were a set of bathrooms, one for boys and one for girls. On my right were a few classrooms, their doors all shut and awaiting for a visitor. Thinking that there was something of importance hidden inside, I pulled on the handle of one of the classroom doors, and yanked it open.

However, unlike that eerie, grisly lecture room downstairs on the first floor, this classroom appeared quite normal, with wooden tables and chairs lined up in pristine columns and rows. The dark green wallpaper was a strange pattern, almost floral-like, it seemed. The lights hanging above on the ceiling were still in perfect condition, shining a fluorescent white glow that drank up the room. There were several posters hung up on the walls, bearing a few Kanji characters so old, I couldn't decipher. Alongside the posters, were some bulletin boards, drooping from the wall and holding a couple of deteriorating, faded pieces of paper.

And of course, there was another pale yellow monitor, hung right over the bulletin board for all to see. Not only that, there was once again a security camera scanning the entirety of the classroom, watching my every cautious move.

Up front was a teacher's podium, painted a lusterless gold with the Hope's Peak symbol imprinted in the front. There was absolutely nothing on the desk, and even had a few dust particles beginning to gather on the surface. It was odd, indeed, but perhaps what was weirder was the chalkboard hung right beyond the podium.

It was a standard chalkboard, really, stretching wide across the front wall with a fresh, smooth face. However, scribbled in chalk, was the chilling message, " _FUCK BASTARDS LIKE YOU_ ". Beside the writing was a poorly drawn figure of Monokuma, holding up a suggestive finger gesture to the viewer.

I found myself shivering at such an atrocious, haunted sight, and quickly shut the door to a close behind me as I raced away.

Without a doubt, it was Monokuma, or the mastermind, who wrote that. What did they even gain from taunting us with horrific, vulgar messages like that? I shook my head, running my hands up and down my bare goosebumped arms. My pace quickened as I passed more and more empty classrooms, possibly holding similar writings inside. For some reason, those words scratched in pale chalk dust seemed to stick to my mind, and with each turn I made down the hall, I saw the chalkboard drawing in front of me.

Deeper down the faint blue corridor, I discovered a neat set of twin doors colored a vibrant purple. There were blacked out circular windows on each door, and beneath the left one was an anchor symbol sketched on. My footsteps faltered and my body came to a complete halt as I stopped to read the sign hanging above the doors. Printed in big, bold letters was the single word, "POOL".

I assumed that beyond this this room was a school swimming pool. An unexplained rush of incitement gnawed through me, and I wondered deep about what this meant. Surely, things at this academy would liven up a bit with a communal pool? Hopefully, this new feature to our school lives would cause more benefit than harm. 

I tried to ignore the voices that whispered the possibilities of a water based murder into my ear.

Reaching out a nervous, trembling hand, I grabbed the silver door handle and pushed inside.

Behind the violet pattered door was a simple, vast common area, with brown checkered floors and neon green walls, fading to a light gradient as it rose higher to the ceiling. On the right side of the room, there was a rack full of swimming boards and colorful pool noodles. Near the shelf and above a roll of different colored swimming ropes, a monitor was hanging from the ceiling, the screen remaining a blank black color. The roof of the room was painted ink, with a cream security camera and, terrifyingly, a Gatling gun dangling from it. With a wide eyed shudder, I realized this abnormal, horrifically sized gun was almost a carbon copy of the one that had killed Makoto.

On the far wall of the room, were two doors, one a dull maroon and the other a dark cyan. Appropriately, the pink one was labeled "GIRLS" and the blue was tilted, "BOYS". I assumed that they were the respective changing rooms for male and female students, and farther, would be the pool.

This wasn't all the foyer had to offer to me, though. Most of all, it held three of my dear classmates, Aoi, Chihiro, and Celeste, standing together and searching the area.

Hearing the door click shut behind me, Aoi turned from where she had been standing to greet my presence with newly found enthusiasm. Her blue eyes were sparkling with passion and joy as she spoke, "Oh, Junko! Hey, guess what!"

She didn't wait for me to guess before exclaiming again, "Guess what I found! A pool! There's a pool here! A POOL! Pool, pool, pool!"

I didn't question her overexcitement. She was the Ultimate Swimming Pro, after all. It was understandable that she would be so fired up about having a swimming pool on campus. Seeing her starry eyed determination, I found myself smiling at her utmost devotion.

"I see." I craned my neck to gaze behind her to catch a glimpse of the locker rooms. I, too, wondered what the pool looked like.

"And there's a ton if exercise equipment in the locker room!" Aoi continued her rant, her voice hasty with delight. "Sakura's gonna be so happy when she finds out!"

"I see that a number of facilities are now available with the admission of the second floor," added Celeste, placing both of her hands beneath her chin in a smile. "Whatever else is going on, I must admit things have been made much more comfortable for us. If things continue like this, the occasional class trial may not be so bad." She let out a polite giggle in contrast to her vicious words. 

I couldn't say at all that I agreed with her, but one sentence was right; with the new floor, more and more rooms were now available to us. Perhaps they held some sort of clue, or anything that aided in our understanding of the situation. I decided to ignore the last part of her statement before striking an attempt at a conversation with Chihiro, who looked rather troubled as she stood beside Aoi.

"Hey, Chihiro," I greeted, pointing behind her at the changing rooms. "Have you checked out the pool yet?"

"Oh, um..." Her eyes fell to meet the floor as she forced out in a shy tone, "I...don't like wearing swimming suits."

I didn't have a reason to argue with her. Most swimming suits fit for girls were all too flashy or exotic, and outfits like those didn't seem to fit Chihiro at all. Even I was not in favor of gaudy bathing suits; in my experience, they were either uncomfortable to wear, or not even meant for swimming at all. 

"But still," Chihiro continued, bringing me back from my indulged thoughts of swimming suits. "Just like what Aoi said, the locker rooms here have all the exercise equipment you could ask for. Maybe I'll give it a try. I'd kind of like to get a little stronger."

"Get stronger?" I repeated, and she nodded reluctantly in response. "That sounds pretty cool. Have you talked to either Sakura or Aoi about it?"

Chihiro shook her head at my inquiry, her wavy caramel hair pressing against the sides of her face. "Not...yet. I'm not even brave enough to step foot into the locker room..." She admitted sheepishly, her cheeks glowing a hint of red as she continued to stare at the floor.

I didn't want to question her about it any further, afraid to provoke some sort of hidden trauma related to locker rooms. Not to mention she already appeared uncomfortable enough, so I let the conversation to that and figured I should check out the changing rooms myself. Walking past the other three girls, I found my way in front of the female locker room.

Partially, I was curious about the pool Aoi had so excitedly talked about, so I reached for the sleek metal handle, the cool silver surface chilling my skin. I pushed my hand down on the handle and pressed against the maroon door, but much to my surprise, it did not budge at all. Even when I tried again with more force, the door didn't move at all under my grip. 

"Huh? It's not opening?" I heard myself question out loud.

Aoi quickly came to my rescue by answering my wonder without hesitation. "Oh! I think you need your handbook to get inside." She pointed to the shiny, grey and black designed card reader resting to the right hand side of the pink door.

"Really?" I let my hand fall slack against the handle and pulled away to study the card reader. 

"Really, really!"

I was impressed at my ability to hold back a scream.

I thought that, by now, I would get used to his cloy, jeering, blood chilling voice. But I was proven wrong, as I felt all of the air inside my lungs get suddenly knocked out from my chest in utter surprise. I flinched at the sudden sound of his voice, almost falling back against the wall as I jumped from my position.

Aoi shared the same reaction as I, recoiling with wide, frightened eyes. "W-What? What are you doing here?" 

Monokuma waved her question off in a halfhearted dismissal. "I'm here to answer Junko's question," he said, waddling from the doorway all the way up to where I stood in front of the locker rooms. "If you want to unlock the locker room, you'll have to swipe your personal e-handbook across the card reader next to the door. However, to ensure maximum security within each locker room, only a boy's handbook can open the boys locker room, and the same goes for the girls!"

"Hm..." Chihiro wondered, cupping her chin with her hand in thought. "But, what if someone opens the door, and then someone else sneaks in?"

Monokuma was visibly angered by this suggestion, as he raised a paw with jutting, sharp silver claws. His ruby eye glowered a deadly crimson color in pure fury as he spat, "Anyone who commits such indecency will be punished without mercy for being a nasty perv!"

"Punished?" I echoed, swallowing a lump lodged in my throat as I felt my heart run quicker and quicker. My eyes flitted to the gun dangling from above, aimed right for the doors of the changing rooms.

"Yes, punished!" It was obvious how bothered he was by the thought of a person sneaking into the locker room of a different sex. "See, there's a Gatling gun mounted on the ceiling, right? And it'll be all DUKKA DUKKA DUKKA!"

"H-Hey!" yelled Aoi, pointing at the humongous gun hanging overhead. "People might get hurt from that!"

"Um...I think it's more likely to kill them." Chihiro corrected her quietly from where she stood.

Celeste was taking this all into consideration as her eyes narrowed in wonder. "But, what happens if someone loans their handbook to someone else?" She brought up. "A boy could borrow a girl's handbook, and that would get them into the girls locker room, would it not?"

Monokuma was taken off guard by such a question. "Wh-?!" He sputtered, leaping back the slightest bit at the sudden, obscene idea. "That never even occurred to me! To think someone could be so low, so disgusting, so devilish! That's so-so stupid!" He grumbled a sling of incoherent complaints beneath his breath. "But now that you've thought of it, I have to forbid such deeds!"

Monokuma stood still, silent, for a brief moment, which I assumed was the time the mastermind controlling him used to update the school regulations. When he flexed back into motion once again, I felt the handbook inside my cardigan pocket buzz against my hip. Reaching into my sweatshirt, I fished out the electronic gadget and opened it to display the new rules.

Sure enough, there it was. "Rule 10: Lending electronic student handbooks to others is strictly prohibited."

Seeing our immediate reaction to read the rules, Monokuma let out a breath of what seems to be satisfaction. "There! So now, nobody can give their handbook to anyone else, right? My brain's made out of 100% quick thinking cotton! I think I just might be a genius!"

Celeste sighed and relaxed her shoulders, slipping her handbook away into one of the many pockets in her exotic goth dress. "Honestly, I do not imagine anyone would have lent their handbook in the first place. After all, they would likely be held responsible for anything that person might do using the handbook."

"But, you know," Aoi crossed her arms and stared off into the distance, eyebrows furrowed in thought. "You seem awfully concerned with all this locker room security stuff. Is there a reason, or...?"

"Can a bear _not_ show some human decency?" Monokuma complained. "I'm just trying to protect you guys from perverts! All you teenagers are totally sex-crazed maniacs, y'know? You're at that age you'd try humping a plastic bottle!" He panted heavily for a dramatic effect that was not needed.

"Where did you even get that from?" Aoi's voice was a mixture of disgust, vexation, frustration, and confusion. 

"That was just an example!" He defended, shooing her off. "Anyways, to keep anything unseemly from happening, I have to maintain a rigorous watch! If I see someone being all gross, I'll turn them into honeycombs on the spot!"

"So..." I faked a cough into my arm and shot a wavering stare at the huge, intimidating gun lying just a few feet away. "If someone were to try and sneak in, they get shot with that thing?"

Chihiro slowly began to back away from the gun, shivering into herself. "Isn't that...kind of extreme?"

Monokuma groaned at our disapproval. "Extreme? I'm just concerned for your safety! You guys are a bunch of teenage girls who boys consider more than attractive! Shouldn't you be grateful for my protection?" He let out a single chuckle escape at the end, signaling his dirty pun, and I cringed immediately at his poor sense of humor.

"Yeah, but killing someone?" Aoi protested. "That's a bit far, don't you think?"

He flapped his paw in the air, ignoring her accusations. "It's not like you haven't seen it before! Remember Makoto?" He giggled madly to himself, and I felt an abrupt rush of viscous spite surge through my veins. I clenched my fist so hard, it began to tremble severely with overspilling nerves. It took every fiber of strength inside my body to prevent myself from lashing out in pure hatred.

Aoi, in response, yelled at him to leave right away, seemingly just as disturbed as I. "I hate you so much! Just go away, we don't need you anymore!"

Monokuma simply shrugged and began to waddle away from his position. I fought the urge to trip him as he ambled to the doorway as he spoke, "Okay, so the new regulation is now in place! See ya!"

Soon after he departed the pool foyer, Aoi's head dipped and shook from side to side in great disappointment. "Man, that stupid bear totally ruined my mood! I don't even feel like swimming anymore..."

"Well, now we know what will happen if we defy one of Monokuma's rules," said Celeste, pointing a slender finger towards the voluminous Gatling gun from the ceiling. I tried my best to refrain myself from looking at the massive weapon ever again, as it brought forth so much suppressed trauma, I knew I couldn't possibly handle it all on my own. I gritted my teeth in a quivering silence and bit back my words. "It's best we don't overstep the limits."

"Ugh, I hate that guy so much." Aoi retorted, letting out a small shiver as she grasped both of her arms. "I can't stand staying here any longer. Just seeing that huge gun freaks me out. I'm gonna go find Sakura."

As she made her way to detach herself from the common room, Chihiro shuffled her feet towards the exit as well, appearing rather conflicted. "I, um, I should be going too." She added quietly, before dashing out after the taller girl in an unexplained haste. The violet toned doors shuddered to a noisy close, slamming vigorously against the doorframe. I found myself wincing at such a loud sound.

"It seems they are gone now," Celeste commented after deliberately watching the two push out of the room. She began to twirl and play with the dark strands of hair that curved against her cheekbones. "Well, I guess I should check out the girls locker room for a bit. Come with?" She shot an elegant, polite smile at me, almost inviting, it appeared. I had little reason to deny her offer, so I nodded my head in answer.

Celeste turned to her left to face the maroon colored door, before swiftly sliding out her own e-handbook from her dress again. Using the small electronic gadget, she simply ran its face against the blank card reader. The machine beeped once, before flashing a tiny, circular green light on the top surface. Seeing this response, Celeste spun around to face me once more. The dainty smile still resting on her face, she proposed, "Shall we go in?"

"Sure, why not?" At my reply, Celeste's hand pushed down against the silver door handle, and I heard the faintest of clicks arise from the action. Pressing against the door's face with little effort, the room swung open to reveal the female changing room inside.

The walls were appropriately tinted a light shade of purple, in a slight gradient pattern just like the walls in the foyer. The floor beneath my platform boots was solid, wooden, smooth, and I could even see my own reflection inside. The ceiling was again painted a midnight black, with a few lights shining a warm light down onto the rest of the room. 

Inside, a variety of exercise equipment were laid in neat piles in front of me. To my left were two sets of pull up bars, polished and pristine, each in perfect condition. Behind the hefty equipment was a vibrant poster, showcasing a five membered male idol group on the cover. Beneath it was a simple mousy grey carpet, visibly washed and taken care of nicely. There were benches placed strategically around the interior of the room, awaiting somebody to sit there. Again, a monitor and a security camera were to be found, and I could start to sense the pattern. A few sets of sparkling green lockers, fake potted plants lying on both sides of the door, everything was put together to give the entire room a professional look to it. There was even a punching bag, dyed a navy blue color, hanging from a sturdy chain that fed from the ceiling above. 

"So there is a place to work out in here, just as Aoi said," I heard myself utter as my eyes jumped from one attraction to the other. "There's... so much stuff."

"Quite convenient, is it not?" Celeste agreed, stepping past me to stand in the midst of the room. "It certainly is impressive. As expected of the school of Ultimates."

My gaze gradually drew attention to the dull pink door sitting at the very far end of the room, directly across from where I was. "Hey, do you think that's where the pool is?" When she turned around at the sound of my voice, I pointed to the object in question to emphasize my point.

"Perhaps. Let's take a look." Celeste grasped the handle with her fist and yanked on the door again, needing no key this time. It swung open with ease, like butter on a pan. 

When I jogged a few paces ahead to catch up with her, the instant, pungent smell of chlorine immediately greeted my nostrils. The overwhelming odor was so sharp, so aromatic, that it quickly dug itself into my brain and began to make my head ache. I quickly found myself dizzied by the intense scent of pool water, and I rubbed my temples with my fingers in a futile attempt to ease the pain.

However, I was almost instantaneously distracted by the awe-striking, remarkable architecture of the school's pool. The hall was so grand and vast, I could feel intimidation radiating from the size alone. The walls were a stainless white tile pattern, with ivory arches rising overhead and stretching as far as the eye could see. Hints of bright blue accented the designs of the wall, like striking lightning against a pale, cloudy sky. It was closely accompanied by an arrangement of iron plates, the rust and age of the metal heavily contrasting the modern feel to the rest of the room. The Hope's Peak logo, printed flawlessly in white paint, laid on the far wall. Beneath it, laid a collection of tall steel lockers, all jammed shut and unoccupied. Snowy bleachers with azure seats lined the sides of the humongous room, bearing vacancy. The floor beneath my feet was sparkling with cleanliness, and the slightest bit slippery, although no one had swam inside yet.

But it was not the splendid interior of the hall that impressed me the most, rather, the pool itself. Calling it a mere swimming pool would be quite the insult; the pool stretched at least fifty meters, a length comparable to Olympic sized swimming pools. Lines patterned blue and white dashed all across the length of the pool, bobbing up and down in the water softly. I could see that the pool extended several feet underwater, housing yet another printed logo of Hope's Peak at the very bottom of the turquoise water. The design, however, was rather distorted and curvy due to the refraction of the water.

"Whoa." I found myself admitting as I took in the entirety of the pool.

"How exquisite," said Celeste, peering up to meet the towering pale arches of the room. "Aoi would certainly love this."

"Do you plan on swimming any time soon, Celeste?" I asked, breathless at the magnificent sight of the beautiful, clear water. Something about the scene of pure, aquamarine water, put me in a state of sheer, heart stopping awe as I gawked at the pool. 

Celeste let out a sigh of dismay. "I am not fond of getting my face wet by water," she explained, raising a hand to caress the side of her pale cheek. "But this pool is another facility left available for our usage, so I can let it slide."

I wasn't sure I had completely had a grasp on her words, but I nodded nonetheless. Instead of bringing it up again, I stood still on the ceramic floor of the hall, not letting a single sound escape my lips as I drank in the new sights of the pool. The only source of noise inside the room was the gentle, nearly inaudible lap of water against the sides of the pool. A sigh wriggled free from my lungs and slipped into the warm, chlorine scented air.

"Well, I do think we should get back to investigating," Celeste broke the delicate silence that had once swallowed the pool room. I blinked a few times before my line of sight finally focused and adjusted itself onto her slender figure. "There are still many places on the second floor left unexplored."

"Yeah, you're right." I said, trailing after her as she began to make her way through the wide open, dark pink door. I shut the door gingerly behind me, careful not to make too much of a sound. Ironically, my boots left loud, deafening echoes as they thumped against the tile and wooden floors.

"There is a library around here somewhere," suggested Celeste as we snaked our way through the girls locker room. "Have you checked it out yet?"

I frowned, trying to search through my clump of memories to find the right one. With no such luck appearing, I answered, "No, not yet."

Celeste let out a single hum as she closed the changing room door with a swift, smooth swooping motion of her arm. The door clicked shut again, and the room became locked once more. "You should take a look. Just make a left turn from the pool foyer and into a pink hallway, where you can find the library."

I found myself targeted under the menacing stare of the Gatling gun, and quickly ducked to a safer place, hopefully out of range. "Um, thanks. I'll check it out." I had some difficulty saying my words. "Where will you be?"

Celeste let out a polite giggle and folded her hands beneath her chin with a close lipped smile. "Around."

Puzzled by her ambiguous answer, I blinked once with an awkward smile of my own. I managed some sort of a wave. "Alright, then. I guess I'll see you later."

Spinning myself around on the toe portion of my shoe, I turned my back towards her. My heels vehemently clunked against the brown checkered floors when I paced away, wonders of this proclaimed library rapidly filling my head. I brushed past the purple twin doors, pushing them ajar with a hand and slipping through the slit that had opened in between. My shoulders bumped into the cold, solid sides of the doors as I stepped back out into the ghastly blue hall.

Yet again, I found myself in a labyrinth of corridors, all varying from one neon color to the next. Once I finally thought I had memorized the layout of the first floor, a new area of the school was presented to me, forcing me to put my brain into work again. My mind was reminded that I needed to explore this floor, and perhaps the next, to my entire extent if I wanted to survive this horrific killing game.

I reluctantly took a few steps away from the pool doors, my body wavering and naturally tilting to one side so I could see the hall better. My skin sensed that the air was significantly colder than before, and all the hairs on my arm erected in response. I unconsciously brushed a clump of my hair behind my shoulder, feeling the hefty weight of the pigtail shift, before I began to walk ahead in small, cautious steps.

Celeste had instructed me to make a left turn into the hallways, where I would find a pink entranceway that held the library inside. Repeating her orders inside my head, I followed what was said and turned left, wandering deeper and deeper into the dark aqua hall. 

As I did, I caught a glimpse of dull magenta at the corner of my eye. I instantly began to weave through the many navy pillars that decorated the inside of the halls, to push into the intersection of the blue and pink corridors. The clashing colors of the different walls blended in an unsightly hue of dark, inky purple, that stretched on for a few inches. Leaving the blue hallway behind, I shuffled into the pink one, although, it looked a bit more maroon than pink. 

The pink hall was wide, vast, with many intersecting pillars that reached up to brush against the ceiling and form into Y shaped arches. It almost resembled a ballroom, if not for the eerie, abnormal lighting and the icy chill of the surrounding air. The lights glowered softly from above, latched onto the undersides of a few arches. I stumbled farther into the corridor, eyes scanning the walls for any signs that would help me.

Luckily for me, I didn't need any complicated directions, because a set of heavy, deep red oak doors awaited me on the left hand side, bearing the plaque, "LIBRARY".

Without much hesitation holding me back, I gripped the lengthy, cold golden handlebar, and yanked the doors open. 

The sight that greeted me was rather pleasant, to say the least. Plush, burgundy carpet floors in a checkered pattern welcomed my aching feet as I soundlessly stepped inside. The ceiling was a warm shade of vanilla, accented with edges of brown, carved into an intricate design that was supported by a few wooden pillars placed in all four corners of the room. The walls of the library were a dark wine shade, making the area feel more tepid than it actually was. 

Shelves upon shelves upon shelves of books lined the entire inside of the library, swallowing the room up with piles of neatly stacked books. Dark oak desks and mini bookshelves laid spread out in the middle of the room, paired with a few pale chairs to lounge on. In the back of the room, there was a long, inky black desk that appeared to be a receptionist desk, with an open computer lying on the surface and a concentrated Kyoko behind it. And on the wall beyond the long table, was a maple door with an aurum doorknob, and a monitor with a security camera hanging above.

Although the aesthetic feel to the library was nice, it didn't help prevent the undeniable fact that it reeked of dust. When I walked around the room to have a closer inspection, I realized that everything was covered in a film of grime. Dust collecting on the bookshelves, dust scattered on the chairs, dust everywhere. They were all clear signs that the library had been neglected for a long time. I felt a pang of doubt ring inside my chest. Why would such a prestigious academy let their own library to waste? It didn't add up, no matter how many theories I made, and I was left feeling unsatisfied by all the concerning mysteries in this school. 

My thoughts of wonder were quickly shattered, however, by the noisy bickering between Toko and Hifumi, taking opposite positions in front of the bookshelf I just so happened to stand near.

"So many books in here, and not even a single copy of my work!" Hifumi exclaimed in pure exasperation, his fingers clenching into a fist. "This is outrageous!"

Toko's hand played with the tips of her long, dark purple braids, fiddling with the loose strands of hair as she retorted, "W-Well, yeah. Why would they have c-comics in a library?"

"They're not just comics!" defended Hifumi, his voice in a far louder tone suitable for a library. "They're pieces of hard work, absolute art! Fanfics take so much dedication!"

"Most "fanfic" is j-just porn drawn by a bunch of a-amateurs." Toko smirked at her snide jab, and I felt myself wince at the attack.

"You just don't get it." Hifumi gritted his teeth in outrage. "Fanfic is the demand of today's society! You wouldn't know, with your outdated literacy novels."

Now, it was Toko's turn to feel offended as she clenched her fist to contain her anger. "H-Hey! Don't t-talk about my writing with that f-filthy mouth of yours!"

"You're calling me filthy?" The argument just seemed to never cease. "I bet you're the one who's secretly into boy-on-boy action!"

"Anime, c-comics, fanfic, boy-on-boy, i-it's all such trashy culture!" I felt as if I aged twenty years listening to the two go on and on about literature. With a defeated sigh of sorts, I peeled myself away from the conflict and walked over to the receptionist's desk in the far back, eager to escape their useless bickering.

Waiting for me there was Kyoko, brushing off the dust of a simple laptop with the Hope's Peak symbol on the back. When I got a bit closer, I realized that the computer was rather old, as it lacked luster and youth in its appearance. I rested my palms on the tabletop and leaned forward to get a better look.

"Is that a laptop?" I questioned, fixing my gaze on the black, grimy screen.

"It's broken," admitted Kyoko, dropping her hand to jam the power button. It bore no response, and the computer remained blank. "I tried pressing the power button many time, but nothing happened."

She pressed a few other random keys on the keyboard, but her attempts were all futile. It was utterly broken, which dispirited my mood. I was hoping to browse the online world using this laptop to see what's going on outside, or even make a signal for help, but it seemed as if the mastermind thought of everything that came to mind. 

We had almost no access to technology, which guaranteed no access for outside help. For now, we were completely confined in this school with only ourselves and our thoughts. It resembled a slow torture, driving each of us slowly towards madness with each passing day. I found myself growing quite frustrated at this detrimental thought, and I exhaled a sharp breath of vexation. Straightening my back, I shuffled away from the desk at last.

A few feet away from where I previously stood, there was a small, cubical bookshelf, crafted carefully from oak with many novels inside. However, everything was coated in a fine layer of dirt and dust, making the sight much more sad and depressing. With soundless, cautious steps, I drifted over to the shelf and halted to stare deep at the dull wooden frame. I mindlessly ran a single finger across the silty surface, collecting a minuscule pile of dust on the tip of my finger. When I pulled my hand back, I saw that my fingertip had been stained a colorless grey, and I blew my finger like a candle to cleanse it of dirt.

Rubbing my index finger against my thumb to rid of any remaining dust, my eyes wandered around the shelf for any hidden clues. It did not take long for it to settle on a manila envelope, which had been propped up to stand on top of the surface of the bookshelf. Intrigued by such an odd object, I reached out my arm to retrieve the letter.

In my hands, it felt rather lightweight, thin, fragile with age. The surface was papery and dusty, as if it had stayed in that position for quite some time. There was a cherry red sticker taped on the mouth of the envelope, sealing it tightly shut. On the bottom right hand corner, the words, "Hope's Peak Office", was printed in spidery, pale caramel letters.

I felt an unexplained dose of pure curiosity dictate my limbs to break the seal on the silty envelope, and it opened with a small cloud of brown dust. Inside, I unearthed a slim, delicate piece of paper that crackled when I pulled it out of its sheath. I unfolded the paper, careful not to tear it by accident, and squinted at the tiny ink words.

"What's that?" I heard Kyoko's footsteps inch closer to where I was, and my head immediately raised at the sound of her voice. Blinking a few times, I tried to search for a reasonable response inside my cluttered head. 

"It's a...letter," I held up the broken envelope and the paper inside for her to see. Her eyes narrowed on the snowy piece of paper, and she leaned closer to get a better inspection.

"What does it say?" She interrogated me.

"Um," I set the manila envelope, now empty of its contents, back down on the grimy shelf. Using my fingers, I gingerly stretched out the paper as much as I could without breaking it, and held it towards the warm light to read the words out loud. "'From the Hope's Peak Academy Executive Office: Throughout the years, we have been committed to shaping the youth who will one day shape the world. We have a long, proud history as an institution of higher learning with full government support. Our graduates enter society ready to take on active leadership roles in every major job field.

"'However, Hope's Peak Academy must now lower the curtain on its glorious history, for the time being.'" I continued to say as my eyes skimmed the letter. "'This decision was not an easy one to make, but serious issues beyond our control have made it necessary. But make no mistake - this is not the end for Hope's Peak Academy. We intend to reopen our doors as soon as the issues forcing our closure have been resolved. That being said, this is the end for now; I would like to personally and sincerely thank everyone for your help and support over the years. For now, we are awaiting official government authorization to formally cease operations.'"

The letter ended rather abruptly, leaving me with more questions than answers. 

I lowered the piece of paper from the light, frowning in sheer confusion. "What does this mean?"

It seemed that as I was reading the letter out loud, somebody else had joined Kyoko and I in discussing the notice. I did not even realize that they had appeared until I heard their voice break my shivering silence.

"Hmm," Byakuya said with the smallest of smirks on his face. "The contents of this letter are quite interesting indeed."

"It would seem Hope's Peak Academy had stopped functioning as a school," offered Kyoko, cupping her chin with her fingers as she stared down the paper I held in my hands. "And judging by the amount of dust the letter had collected, it doesn't seem to have happened recently. If I had to guess, I'd say this letter could be at least a year old."

"So..." I heard myself utter blankly. My mind did not have the capability to keep up with her theories, and my thoughts all swirled inside my head to create a deep whirlpool of perplexity. "You're saying Hope's Peak closed down at least a year ago?"

I doubted even my own words. How could the school have closed down a year ago? When we just arrived at Hope's Peak, it could have only been a few days. At that time, everything was completely normal, and there was nothing on the news saying that the school had ceased to open. It didn't make any sense. 

Byakuya crossed his arms over his chest. "Most likely, the mastermind took over the abandoned school in order to put on this little performance."

"B-But..." It was difficult trying to voice out my raw confusion. "Wouldn't that mean the school was closed down when I got here just a few days ago? It didn't seem that way at all. Plus, if the school _had_ shut down, don't you think it would've been in all the newspapers and stuff?"

"That must have been part of the mastermind's plan," Byakuya said, nudging his glasses higher up his face. "They lure us all in here, making sure we were unsuspecting of anything, then forced us into this killing game. Someone who could create a place to judge and execute people could potentially be capable of anything." He scoffed, glancing at the envelope lying discarded on the shelf. "Of course, that's all assuming that this letter is real."

The look of pure focus never left Kyoko's face, even when she admitted, "If it _is_ real, though, that does solve one mystery surrounding the school. The reason there are no other students here could be because the school had already closed down."

"Yeah, that might be it," I commented, holding up the letter to my face again. "But what about this part? Where it says, "This decision was not an easy one to make, but serious issues beyond our control have made it necessary.'" I looked up from the piece of paper with what I'm sure was an expression of bewilderment. "What did they mean by serious issues? That's apparently why the school had to close. Is there any connection between that and what's happening to us now?"

"If the events are in fact connected," hummed Kyoko. "Uncovering that connection would be a useful clue, on top of figuring out the mastermind's motive. Although, I can't really say any more until we find more details."

Byakuya rolled his eyes with an exasperated sigh. "So in other words, only the mastermind knows the truth right now." He sounded annoyed, almost upset, at the fact that he could not figure out the secrets behind the school. 

I thought of Kyoko's previous statements. A connection of events. The mastermind's motive. It could be anything, honestly. From what Monokuma said a few days ago, the reason why he wanted to force us all in such a horrid situation was all for the taste of despair. But that answer was so odd, so vague, that I didn't believe it was all. Was there something more to their motive? Or was it truly just despair?

The more I tried to ponder, the more my brain started to hurt. It seemed that with every question, more and more began to pop up in placement of an answer. With a heavy, deflated sigh, I shook my head and set the letter back in its original position, trying my best to refrain from overthinking.

"Well, I think it's about time to return to the dining hall," Kyoko announced, shattering our uncomfortable stillness. "We probably can find more leads if we hear what the others have to say."

A ripple of incoherent murmurs and grumbles echoed throughout the vast, warm library, seemingly in agreement to her offer. Without waiting for somebody to step forward, Kyoko began to walk towards the exit, and we trudged after her path in follow.

The atmosphere amongst the five of us was unreadable; it was a mixture of disappointment, grudge, and concealment. We didn't discover much inside the library that lead us towards any clues, and it was obvious that we were all upset by that. Even though we now had a new floor available to us, we found ourselves stuck in the same hopeless situation once again.

Was that the mastermind's plan? To give us a sliver of shining hope, just to crush it into pure despair? I could not think of it as anything else.

I couldn't meet a single person's eyes the entire time we made our way to the first floor. It appeared that nobody else had any reason to speak either, although I did see Hifumi and Toko giving each other pointed glares, left over from their argument before. Other than that, we were soundless the whole way there, the only noises being our gentle footsteps hitting the stairs and the tile floors.

Kyoko opened the double metal doors to the dining hall, leaving me to hold it open for the remaining members of the group. As soon as the three trickled in, the rest of our class came shuffling in right after, and I found myself holding the door open for a longer time than expected. I stood at the entranceway, propping the door with my arm, until everybody eventually filed inside of the dining hall.

Right after the last student entered, I let my arm drop to my side and rushed in after them, hurrying in quite a haste to my usual seat before anything could be discussed without my knowing.

I slid into my chair, wordless, as everybody seated at the dining table exchanged troubled and curious looks with one another. The air was trembling with anticipation, peaking with our shared anxiety. I folded my arms on top of each other on the tabletop surface, waiting for the conversation to begin.

"Okay, ladies and gentlemen!" With no surprise, Kiyotaka was the first to speak, officially starting our discussion. "How'd it go? Did anyone discover any interesting new anything?"

Immediately after he spoke, Hifumi exclaimed from his end of the table, "There's a library! Without manga, of course, but still!"

"And a pool! A freakin' pool! And locker rooms filled with exercise equipment!" Aoi matched his eagerness, almost bouncing from her seat with sheer excitement at such discoveries. 

Sakura sighed deeply, shaking her head. "There was not, however, anything resembling an escape route."

I felt my heart sank at her words, and especially when nobody rebutted her statement. It was indeed true that none of us had found an exit, and we were still trapped inside of this school. Just how many Class Trials and deaths would we need to escape this goddamned place?

Kiyotaka, in contrast, declared easily with little worries, "Well, hey! There's no reason to get all sulky! Wait 'till you hear about my amazing discovery!"

"What did you find, asshole?" Mondo growled, tipping his chair further back until it balanced from almost sixty degrees. 

"The warehouse and bathhouse on the first floor of the dorms are now open!" Kiyotaka ignored Mondo's additional insult as he went on to ramble, "And the warehouse is chock-full of food, clothes, whatever you want. There's so much it's insane!"

Celeste let out a soft exhale as she cupped her hands together in her lap. "Keep in mind, of course, that going out at nighttime is still prohibited."

Mondo huffed and craned his neck to the right to glare at Kiyotaka, his menacing gaze shooting right past me. "Okay, and what about a fuckin' way out of here? You find anything like that?"

Kiyotaka hesitated, visibly caught off guard by the sudden retort. "Oh, well...um..."

"There wasn't anything in the warehouse we could use to get our asses outta here?" Mondo spat, letting the legs of his chair hit the flat ground as his postured straightened. "Nothing?"

There was no response to that, and Mondo's demand simply echoed and dissolved in the heavy, tense, death scented air.

"You fuckin' people," he shook his head in great disappointment. I could hear the rage beginning to boil inside his voice, threatening to burst at the seams. "Who gives a shit if we have a goddamn pool now? Or a warehouse, or whatever the fuck! We're still trapped in this piece of shit school! We need to find a goddamn way out!"

His tone gradually increased in volume until he uttered the last spiteful word, enunciating it rather harshly. It was like he was venting, or blaming us for unconsciously adapting to our new life. It was clear that out of everybody here, he was the most desperate one to escape. For what reason, I did not know, but surely, it had to be important.

Celeste, however, merely giggled at his fury and covered her lips with a pale hand. "Now, now. There is no point in taking your anger out on us." She let her hand drop from her face, allowing it to fall slack in her lap. "Adaptation is key, yes? For now, we must each find a way to enjoy our current situation."

"Enjoy our current situation?" Mondo repeated in a voice much more aggressive than hers, and I found myself tilting away from his line of wrath. "What, are you a fuckin' lunatic or something?"

Celeste chuckled lightly once again. "No, just more mature."

"A-Anyways," Kiyotaka butted in before Mondo's anger could escalate any further. "Let's just continued our investigation, and let everyone know if you should discover something."

"So, are we done for today?" questioned Kyoko, tapping her finger against the tabletop in a soft, rhythmic pattern. 

"W-Well..." Kiyotaka's spirit had visibly shrunken, and he looked far less enthusiastic than before. I could almost feel the pressure of his disheartenment pressing down on my shoulders as well when he said, "Yeah, I guess so."

It felt almost like ending a song on the wrong tune. Our conversation seemed incomplete, unsatisfying, and yet, it still came to a grinding halt that nobody could pick up on. I wanted to hear maybe some words of affirmation, or a newly discovered area that would aid us, but that appeared to be the absolute end of our meeting. 

It was just as Mondo had said. If nothing we discovered helped us in escaping, then why would we bother in doing so? This wasn't like some holiday vacation trip to enjoy; it was a true matter of life and death. We needed everything to be in our favor to survive this place. An exit, tools, anything, must be used in order to escape.

If we didn't uncover any of those things, were all of our discoveries useless then?

I thought of this when everybody reluctantly rose from their seats and departed the dining hall, one by one, until I was the only person left. As the room cleared of students, I was left alone with just my thoughts and myself.

I hated how much my mind tormented my soul, bringing up one thought after the other, until there was no more room left inside my head to concentrate anymore. I was dizzied by everything that had occurred for the past few days; I was confined in what used to be a prestigious academy, I saw my family home in shreds, three of my friends were murdered, and it was all done by the hand of the mastermind, whose identity I didn't even know of. For all I knew, they could possibly be an adult psychopath, turning our pain into pure entertainment for themselves as they watched us slowly succumb to despair.

Although we were a rather large group, it wouldn't be long until the numbers dwindled down to zero. We had already lost three people over the course of a single day, and who knows how many more lives will be taken. Hell, I didn't even know my fate in all of this; I could die tomorrow, and easily become another debate topic amongst my peers. I wasn't even sure if I would make it out alive, at this rate.

There was just too much, I couldn't possibly try staying awake to ponder it all.

I stayed in my room for the entirety of the day, too fatigued to do anything else, yet too cowardly to fall asleep.

*

"Good morning, everyone! It is now 7 a.m. and nighttime is officially over! Time to rise and shine! Get ready to greet another beautiful day!"

I had practically memorized Monokuma's morning greeting, but that didn't stop me from being constantly annoyed by his sudden, obnoxious voice. Each time I heard his morning announcement, I want to roll over and cover my ears until it faded away. But I knew I mustn't be tardy yet again, as it was starting to become a pattern for me to arrive later than the others. So against my own free will, I used all of my strength to haul my body up from my bed, and stumbled in front of the mirror.

I had never seen myself look so exhausted before in my entire life. Without the usage of makeup, my dark circles became more prominent against my ashen skin, and my face was drained of saturation. My hair had gone limp and frizzy, despite being now gifted with a hairbrush to tame the matted locks. The color of my eyes were the dullest they've ever been; what used to be a startling baby blue now sulked of lusterless cyan, not even bothering to sparkle beneath the light. It looked as if I had aged ten years over the course of five days, and even I could hardly recognized myself as the person I used to be.

As I got dressed with a heavy lack of enthusiasm and haste, I pondered these thoughts inside my head. Did the killing game change me? I dismissed the question as soon as it crossed my mind. Without a doubt, this killing school life had altered my identity to somebody I no longer knew. I could even feel it sinking into my bones, reminding me of how much more tired I was as each day passed. I felt as if all the remnants of joy dwelling inside of me had been erased, and I was left as nothing more than an empty shell, trying to grasp onto a hope I could never reach.

I combed through the thick, snarled knots inside my hair with my fingers, grimacing when my hand got stuck in the dreads. But with a little force, and some impressive patience, I was able to free my hair of tangles, and brushed through the strawberry blonde locks with profound ease. Setting down the hairbrush on my nightstand, I swiftly fastened my hair into the usual twin pigtails, inching the rubber bands closer and closer to my scalp until it was tightened properly. Pushing back my long bangs, now in need of a trim, I slid both clips into my hair. 

Somehow, I had the energy to straighten my loose, bleached white tie, before I exited my room once again, slipping my door key into the pocket of my wrinkled cardigan.

As I shut the door behind me, careful not to let any loud sounds erupt, I spotted Chihiro leaving her room from across the hall. Letting go of my grasp on the handle, I called out in greeting, "Oh, hey! Good morning, Chihiro!"

It seemed as if I caught her off guard a bit, because she flinched instinctively and whipped her head around to face me. But as soon as she did, her face immediately softened with relief, seeing it was just me. "O-Oh, good morning, Junko."

I stepped a few feet away from my dorm room, giving her a slight wave with my hand. "Are you heading to breakfast?" I questioned, trying to start up small talk as we both made our way down the halls, and towards the cafeteria. 

She nodded gently, as if she was somehow nervous. "Yeah." She gave a simple, quiet answer that I took into account.

It only took a minute, or even less than that, for both of us to arrive at the dining hall in a comfortable silence. I reached out and held the door open for her to enter, and she thanked me with a soft response under her breath. Letting the double doors slam close behind me, I trailed into the hall after her and located my seat without any problems.

"Good morning, Junko! Good morning, Chihiro!" Aoi was as cheery as ever when she greeted us from her chair, a relaxed smile on her face.

"Morning," I replied, and I heard Chihiro echo my answer in reaction to Aoi's statement. My gaze flitted across the room, scanning the faces that were currently present. "Is everyone here already?"

Yasuhiro shook his head from his end of the table, seemingly in high spirits. "Nope! Still waitin' on Byakuya and Taka."

My eyebrows furrowed at his reply, and I glanced around the dining hall to confirm that fact. Sure enough, the seat beside me, Kiyotaka's seat, was empty, and from a few feet away, I saw that Byakuya was missing from his table as well. "Byakuya's no surprise, but it's strange Taka's not here yet." I commented.

Celeste, from across the table, let out an airy, slight laugh that was covered by her pale, slender fingers. "Knowing Taka, I imagine he is trying to get the King of Tardiness up and out of bed."

"I'm sure they'll be here soon enough," Sakura chided, sparing a glance at the twin metal doors. "Just be patient."

And as if on cue, they burst open with vigor from an unknown source, causing many of us seated to jump from our chairs in surprise. A collection of startled screams exchanged through the air, although they sounded more like yelps than cries of terror. My balance was suddenly thrown off, and I had to grip the edge of the table in order to stabilize and prevent myself from tipping over. Jerking my head around, I turned to catch the face of the perpetrator. 

It was one of the late arrivals, Kiyotaka Ishimaru. Although, there was an odd, grave look of concern spread over his ashen face. His dark crimson eyes were wide as he announced, "Bad news, everyone! There is a mystery afoot!"

"Huh?" Yasuhiro was visibly puzzled, just like the rest of the class. "What happened?"

"I-It would seem Byakuya refuses to leave his room!" Kiyotaka exclaimed, worry lacing his rushed, desperate words. "I stood there, pressing his doorbell over and over, but he never showed himself."

A million possibilities came flooding into my head. I recalled the last time somebody was tardy to breakfast; it was only a couple days ago, when Sayaka hadn't made an appearance to our meeting, and was found dead inside the dorms. A cold, wormy feeling of deja vu crawled throughout my body, staining my thoughts with anxiety. I swallowed a growing lump in my throat and tried to ignore how my heart rate rapidly increased. "Maybe he just...wasn't there."

Kiyotaka shared the same fears as I. "I'd like to think so," he concurred as a trickle of sweat raced down the side of his face. "But I'm worried something might have happened to him."

It didn't take a genius to figure out what he meant. The worst possible feeling of dread sank into my body, chilling the very blood in my veins. My heart rammed inside of my chest, and I realized with absolute horror that I knew this feeling all too well. It was like my body was pumping out adrenaline, preparing me for the complete worst and hyping up my fight or flight response. It was a sensation so primal, so animalistic, that I knew what this meant for me.

I didn't want to believe it, but there was a chance that he was dead.

My mouth felt utterly dry as I tried to speak. "I-It might be a good idea if we all split up and go look for him."

Kiyotaka's demeanor instantly lifted at my idea. "Ah! I was just about to suggest the same thing!" He declared.

"Okay, then I'll go check his room one more time," Aoi offered, a veil of worry draped across her expression. "I'm just gonna keep on hammering that button 'till I get a response!"

Sakura gave her friend a nod of approval. "Very well, then the rest of us can go check the rest of the building."

"Yeah," Yasuhiro was visibly anxious, sweat dotting his forehead as he tried to speak. "Before it's, y'know...too late."

His words left an uneasy, nauseating impression on the rest of us, fueling us with pure concern. Right away, we all fled from the dining hall area, dreading the worst.

My breathing only grew more heavy as I burst from the doors, eyes scanning the corridor hopelessly for any clues of the tall, blonde heir. I hadn't a clue on where he had gone, and my mind was pulling a complete blank. I personally didn't know Byakuya enough to know his whereabouts, or even a hint about where he was. It was going to be trial and error, it seemed.

A loud crack exploded into the air, and I whipped my head around to find the source of the sound. To my relief, it was just Aoi, banging her fist against his dorm room a few dozen feet away. She shouted a few incoherent demands for him to come out, but I was certain he was somewhere other than his room. Brushing a strand of hair out of my parched mouth, I raced for the stairs at once.

Perhaps he was upstairs, checking out the second floor again today. I couldn't think of a single place where he'd be downstairs, so I made a beeline towards the stairwell as soon as I registered the thought. My footsteps were loud, clumsy, cacophonous, as I ran up the stairs in such a haste, I almost tripped over my heels. My hand messily slid up across the silver handlebar as I traveled from one floor to the next, until I had finally reached the second story of the school.

After rushing up a flight of stairs in record speed, my breathing was bound to get more weighty. My exhales forced their way out from my dehydrated lips, my lungs wheezing for a break of fresh air. The pattern of my breathing was no longer rhythmic, as now, they were choppy, shaky, desperate. My blood roared inside my ears as the blue colors of the second floor surrounding my vision blurred.

First, I checked inside the vibrant purple doors of the pool foyer for Byakuya, fumblingly yanking both doors open. My gaze darted around the small common room, bouncing off the brown tiled floors all the way up to the inky ceiling. But no matter how much I tried to search, there were no signs that Byakuya had even been inside. I couldn't possibly check the locker rooms, because I only had access to the female changing room, so I admitted defeat there. Growing exasperated, I let the doors slam to a shut behind me, not even waiting for them to fully close as I ran away.

The air was suddenly warm, almost too warm for my liking, as I tumbled from one hallway to the next. Maybe it was the pure panic filling my bloodstream, or perhaps it was the rapid trepidation screaming inside my chest, but whatever it was, it made me feel feverish as I traveled through the upstairs. Raw, inhumane terror drove me to keep going, and I found myself bursting into the pink tinted corridor.

The only room in this hall was the library, sitting elegantly to my left with both of its oak doors closed. Reaching out a trembly hand, I grasped the golden handlebar and inched closer to the entrance. I gulped down the knot of anxiety nurturing inside my body, jamming all of my fear into a small box inside my stomach. And before it even got a chance to erupt and spill into my veins, I jerked the door open, using all of my strength.

I was fearing for the horrid, absolute worst: a bloody crime scene, a fleshy body, a glinting murder weapon. 

But what I saw was the exact opposite of what I had imagined.

It caught me so off guard, I could stop the cry of pure surprise from escaping my lips. Out of every single possibility I had concocted inside of my worried, crammed mind, none of them even resembled this the slightest. 

What I saw in front of me was Byakuya Togami, seated luxuriously at a smooth, dark oak table, with a thick navy novel in his right hand. The other was gripping a ceramic mug of coffee, held directly underneath the dim, yellow glow of a nearby lamp. One of his legs were crossed over the other, slightly bobbing up and down in the air as a fidget of sorts. His eyes were narrowed, concentrated and fixated deeply onto the contents of his book. He appeared perfectly at ease, and perhaps, this was paradise to him. To be alone in a school library, surrounded by nothing else but darkness and novels, with a cup of black coffee by his side. I almost felt regretful for disturbing his peace.

"Byakuya?" I heard myself exclaim, falling back a bit into the doorway. He didn't bother to acknowledge my shock nor my presence. "W-What are you doing?"

Hearing my sudden inquiry, he rolled his eyes and merely scoffed at my confusion. "I'm fishing." He raised the blue leather novel to shield his eyes from the sight of me, standing in the door's opening, which I found to be rather rude. "Or can you not see the book I so obviously have in my hand? I'm clearly trying to read, so if you could be quiet..."

"Reading?" I repeated, not budging from where I stood still. "What are you doing here? Everyone's super worried about you!"

"Worried?" It was now his turn to echo my previous words. "And why, exactly, would you be worried about me?"

I bit my lip, contemplating the best way to approach this awkward conversation. "Well, you didn't show up at breakfast today, so we all thought something happened to you," I tried, but I got the sense that he wasn't listening to a thing I had to say. "W-We made a promise to meet and eat together, so..."

Byakuya sighed deeply, clearly annoyed by our unnecessary concern for him. He snapped his book shut, the pages clashing together with a loud noise that emanated a cloud of dust. "A promise? Can't I get a second's peace and quiet around here?"

Setting the heavy novel down on the table's surface, he arose from his seat, soundless and smooth. He shot a single glare at me before scoffing once again, like he was trying to purposely insult me without words. Captivated by his arrogance and audacity, I didn't even realize when everybody else filed into the library, pushing past me and gathering around Byakuya.

"Byakuya!" Kiyotaka shouted at once, pointing a finger of accusation towards the aforementioned, who said nothing in response. "So this is where you've been hiding!"

Yasuhiro shook his head, squinting his eyes as he took in the poorly lit library. "The heck are you doin' here, man?"

"We were very concerned." Sakura added, her tone a lot calmer than the outbursts of everybody else. It seemed as if she was the only one Byakuya bothered to respond to, as he deliberately chose to ignore Kiyotaka and Yasuhiro.

"Well, you had no reason to be," he answered, crossing his arms. "I was just reading."

"Reading what?" Aoi questioned from the back, standing on her toes to try and get a better look. I had a good three inches on her, so I was able to see through the crowd with little problem.

Byakuya placed a firm palm on the face of the book he was just reading, sparing a glance down at the navy cover. "Just this mystery novel," he replied shortly with a small smirk playing with his lips. "I've never read such a...coarse novel before, but it might just prove useful at some point."

"W-Wait, so are you gonna use what you're learning in there to betray us?" cried Hifumi, nibbling on his fingernails out of pure panic.

"Don't be stupid," said Byakuya, the smirk never leaving his face as he spoke. "It's just something to keep in mind, sort of like reference material."

I felt my eyes widen at his hollow jeers, and a newly found rush of perplexity and anger began to bubble up inside of me. "R-Reference material?"

Byakuya continued to elaborate, as if it were all perfectly natural for him; in fact, he even seemed the slightest bit irritated at the fact that we couldn't understand his twisted mind. "If I decide to fight, of course I'll come up with something original." The flat, crystal lenses of his glasses shone vigorously for a brief moment as he lifted his chin to stare at the rest of us. It was like he was trying to provoke a reaction from us by purposely being controversial, or perhaps he was just that arrogant. "Otherwise, this game of ours will be totally boring, right?"

"B-Boring?" I heard myself force out my exact thoughts onto my tongue. "What do you mean by that?"

"It's not often you get to take part in such a high-stakes, high-tension activity," he explained, short of patience. He let out an amused chuckle at the sight of our puzzled faces surrounding him. "So if you're going to do it, you have to make sure it's entertaining, not utterly boring."

I could not stop the chill that raced down my spine as he spoke so easily of murder. He even seemed quite pleased with himself for rousing up original ideas in this killing game, as his small smirk deepened into a eerie smile. It was like human lives meant nothing to him, as if they were all toys he'd use to entertain himself during moments of apathy. For a split moment, he reminded me of Monokuma himself.

Mondo and Byakuya must've been war enemies in a past life, because the biker gang leader soon began to yell accusations at the heir once again. "What the fuck do you mean, "game?" That's so fucked up!" He growled between clenched teeth as his fingers formed into a fist.

Byakuya dismissed his rage with so much ease, it impressed and horrified me at the same time. "But it _is_ a game," he pressed on further, like he was intending on extending Mondo's anger with his words. "It's a game of life or death, which can only have one winner. That's all there is to it."

"Basically," a lighter, thicker female voice cut into the conversation, like a knife through butter. As she gracefully made her way through the crowd, the remaining students rippled and parted as Celeste started to walk towards the front. "A zero-sum game, no?"

"Huh?" From beside me, Aoi let the confused statement escape her lips as she watched Celeste with furrowed eyebrows.

Celeste's smile was rather smug, patient, as she began to explain. "It is a part of game theory, a mathematical model. In this type of game, in order for one person to gain something, another must necessarily lose something." Her eyes darkened as her voice trailed off, and quite the grave look took over her face as she stared us down. "In other words, it is a situation in which participants must compete for position or resources. Entrance exams, sports tournaments, job openings, even the killing school life, are all examples of a zero-sum game. In fact, most social interactions fall into this category."

Sakura nodded slowly as she processed the new information fairly well, unlike me, who was struggling to comprehend what was said. "So, sort of an elimination match."

Celeste resumed with her speech, placing her hands on top of one another as she nodded in approval. "Everyone must scramble to obtain something which is limited. For you to succeed, someone else must fail. In our case, the killing game, our "limited resource is that only one of us can successfully be the blackened."

The soulless, ghastly look in her crimson eyes haunted me to no end, and her deathly words continued to echo painfully inside of my ears. If the information she just said was reliable, then our current situation was indeed a game for us to play. It was a game tailored by the mastermind, who obtained us as pawns to control and play as for mere entertainment. It was just like any other social activity, just as Celeste said.

"So, this game was designed from the beginning to force one of us to try and defeat all the others," Byakuya restated, his arms recrossing against his chest in satisfaction of his understanding. "Just like all the other video games you can find, there can only one winner in the end."

My mind was spinning with every new fact, trying its best to make out the entire situation. This was all the mastermind's idea; to create a game so brutal, so bloody, so real, and shove us onto the battleground to fight until only one survivor remains. By using motives and material to trick us into playing along, the puppet master ensured that this game would extend to their desire, which was conclusively the very end.

"That...was the mastermind's plan?" I voiced my swirling theories out loud, unaware that others could hear me. "To lock us in, keep us here, and force us to fight one another? That-That can't be it!"

"But it can only be so," Celeste countered, hiding her smile behind her raised fingers. "The motive videos were a push for us to begin conflicting with one another. The mastermind must have wanted us to maintain the desire of escaping the school, so their game would keep on going. If those who want to escape managed to adapt and give up hope, then there would be no reason to continue playing the game."

"But why would I want to stop playing?" laughed Byakuya, causing a ceaseless shiver to run throughout my entire bloodless body. "It's so much fun."

I had only seen the lurid look in those eyes once before, and it was during a zoo visit when I was younger, where I had wandered off to the hyena's cage.

Somebody who could smile at such things must not be human. His twisted grin was full of so much evil, corruption, and desire. I tried and tried, but ultimately failed to understand his thought process. I simply couldn't comprehend how and why he enjoyed this so much, how and why he was so carefree. 

Was he even one of us at this point? Or was he a person even more horrifying than the mastermind?

Celeste let out a weightless sigh. "It sounds as if you do not acknowledge even the possibility that you may lose, am I right?"

"Of course." Byakuya's face was a steel mask of egotism and sheer confidence in his reply, as he grinned in self-satisfaction as he answered truthfully. His smile chilled me to the very core; not only did he find pleasure in murder, but he also was not afraid to sacrifice us all for his victory. He truly, utterly terrified me.

Celeste giggled tactfully at his arrogant response. "I'd expect nothing less from the Togami heir apparent. For you, the Ultimate Affluent Progeny, these trials and games exist solely for you to beat, even if lives are at stake."

Aoi's demeanor shot up like a crackling firework, sparkling of rising fury and demand as she pointed accusingly at the blonde heir. "You talk like that, but what if you end up dead?"

Byakuya scoffed in pure dismissal of her exclamation. "I won't. It simply isn't possible."

"Who the fuck do you think you are?" Mondo roared in a heavy tone of raw wrath. He began to crack his knuckles, visibly angered by Byakuya's arrogance, and I felt myself wince at an invisible impact. "You think you're some god who can never fuckin' lose?"

"You know, I still just can't believe it," Byakuya ignored his sling of furious shouts and insults. "An uneducated, brain-dead, useless piece of garbage like you has survived this long. That's rather impressive, don't you think?"

"I'm gonna fuckin' kill you!" Mondo did not take his backhanded comment too well, as he began to roll up the sleeves of his jacket in preparation of a fight. I was suddenly thrown back to the first day we arrived at this school, when the two of them had their first quarrel. I had the sense that I would be needed to interfere soon.

"Like I said," repeated Byakuya, a knowing smile playing his lips. "I won't die."

Just as Mondo was about to charge towards him, Celeste sighed once again and put her hand out to halt him. "Do not bother arguing with him. For him, the concept of losing simply does not exist. He is convinced that he will succeed, no matter what stands in his way, as he was raised to think this way."

Byakuya's only response to her words were a roll of his eyes. "Anyway, let me just say this to all of you," he shot a stinging glare at all of us, daring for an objection. I swallowed thickly, deeply terrified by the pointed look he beat down on me. It was like he could read my thoughts, breaking them into pieces, before sending my brain into pure shock. "You all need to try harder. If an opponent isn't going to give it their best, then where's the fun for me? Wouldn't that be so boring?"

I almost didn't catch the soft, meek protest that wriggled its way from the back of the crowd. 

"No..." mumbled Chihiro, her eyes beginning to swell with unreleased tears of pain.

"Hm?" Byakuya challenged, tilting his head to the side as he scowled down at her shorter figure.

"T-This...isn't a game." She rebutted, her voice trembling and shaking with pent up emotion. "Our lives are on the line, you know..." She paused for a breath of air in between her quivering statements. "To kill your own friends is...is...it's horrific!" Her tone became stronger, more spiteful, yet more hurt as she forced the word out, and I could feel each ache and pain in her heart through her words.

I wholly agreed with the entirety of what she said. We were friends, or at the very least, acquaintances. The thought of murdering one another should never cross our minds. Even in a situation as grim and commanding as this, we couldn't afford to give in to despair and play by the mastermind's rules. It wouldn't take a single thing in the entire world, not money, not fame, nothing, to convince me enough to kill one of my friends. I couldn't even do that to a stranger, let alone my classmate. The mere mention of it sickened me to no end, and left me pondering how anybody could possibly be so cruel.

However, Byakuya did not see it the same way.

"Friends?" He scorned in rejection. "Who decided that?"

Chihiro was visibly caught off guard by his harsh words, as she flinched with wide, quivering eyes. "Huh?"

"We're not friends," Byakuya lectured coldly, his voice devoid of any hints of empathy. He sounded utterly bored and rather irritated that he'd have to repeat himself over and over again. "No, quite the opposite. We're in competition-we're enemies."

"B-But, still-"

"But what?" He finally snapped out of pure exasperation at her desperate attempts to rebut. "Stop trying to force your contradictions on me and just accept what I'm telling you."

It was obvious how disturbed and frightful Chihiro was, as she bit her lip anxiously and dropped her gaze to the ground. "Um..."

"Yes?" questioned Byakuya, daring her to say any more. "If you have something to say, say it. Otherwise, keep your mouth closed. You're just wasting breath."

Even though I took no part in their argument, I could still feel the excruciating pain of his jagged, edged words cut through my heart. A forced exhale escaped my lead heavy chest, and my shoulders drooped at the sight of Chihiro's regretful, teary face.

"I-I'm sorry." She tried to apologize, but her voice was too weak to be audibly heard.

Mondo's anger rekindled its roaring fire, and he set off at the final straw. "Hey, shithead!" He yelled, tone rough and aggressive like a predator seizing prey. "You get off on bullying people that can't fight back? How dare you talk to her like that, you little fucker!"

Byakuya, despite the abundance of knifelike insults being thrown in his direction, showed no signs of disturbance at all. In fact, he even laughed at Mondo's threats and shook his head. "So, you're back to pretending to be friends again? How long do you think that's going to last?"

"Okay, I've had it!" That last, smug remark that slipped from Byakuya's lips was what ultimately pushed Mondo off the edge, as he began to shove his way through the thick crowd, who parted immediately in immense fright. "I'm gonna fucking kill you!"

"H-Hey, calm down!" Aoi tried to stand in his way, which worked to some extent.

"I _am_ calm!" He yelled in answer, a shade of fury red staining the skin of his face. His voice was like a whip, cracking the air with a mighty swing and stinging my body with its intense vigor. I could feel my heart leap from its original position inside of my chest, jumpy and trembling from the high tension that engulfed the room.

Aoi sighed, shaking her head in utter disbelief. "How is _this_ calm?"

"Anyway," retorted Byakuya, his tone dripping of menace and poison as he spat the words out for us to hear. "I don't have any intention of working with the rest of you any longer. To cooperate during an elimination game is..." He hesitated for a concise moment as he searched for the right word. "Well, frankly, it's a waste of time. And I hate wasting my time."

"Hey, what do you mean, "waste of time"?" I tried to invalidate, his insolence bothering me to no end. I attempted to raise my voice out of the building anger inside of me, but when I spoke my words, they came out as trembling, choppy sentences. "If we work together, wouldn't that benefit us all?"

"Benefit us?" He snorted, shooting down my objection with little difficulty, and I instinctively flinched at how lifeless his voice sounded. "How is any of that going to benefit us? Engaging in "friendly" group meals is out of the question. Someone could easily poison our food."

"T-There's no way anyone would actually do that!" I wanted to prove him wrong, but I knew there was little I could do. Even if I didn't want to believe it with my entire being, my body, my soul, my mind, I knew that deep down, he was right. It was a great risk for us to all gather with resources vulnerable to taint, especially resources we would have to consume. I was just trying to talk myself out of it.

"Really?" Byakuya challenged me with the exact words I knew he was going to say. "I think it's very possible. After all, we already saw an act of betrayal earlier, haven't we?"

It didn't need much more explanation for the rest of us to understand what he was talking about. Sayaka's betrayal towards Makoto, which ended in her death, had left a lasting impression on all of us. If the thought of treachery had already been found implanted in one of our minds, Sayaka's, to be more exact, then it wouldn't take long for somebody else to have the same desire. It was like a disease, infecting the minds of the desperate, and driving them to a point of insanity, where they would be willing to betray and sacrifice everyone around them to get what they want. That idea truly horrified me. 

"I really fucking hate you." growled Mondo behind gritted teeth, watching with heated, resentful eyes as Byakuya began to turn his back and walk away.

"All I'm saying is that, ultimately, you are free to do whatever you want on your own," he called as he forcibly pushed past our group with a head held high. He didn't bother to look back at us even once, not even when he was addressing us. "Goodbye."

Without another word, he slammed the double oak doors behind him, and left us in a deafening silence.

I found myself frozen in pure, paralyzing shock at what had just happened. I could not even utter a single word of disapproval when he walked away with those hollow, bothersome reminders. My body was numb and still, disobeying every order I forced onto it to move. With my breath lodged inside my hoarse, scratchy throat, my mind began to race faster than any olympic runner.

"Was he...really serious about all that?" Yasuhiro said the exact words that were on my train of thought. He looked rather distressed, ceaselessly staring at the library doors as if waiting for Byakuya to come back.

"He was, without a doubt." answered Celeste, mindlessly braiding a strand of loose hair that fell from her bangs. Mondo scoffed, unclenching his fist at her firm response.

"Well, fuck him, then." He snarled, voicing his clear hate towards the aforementioned.

"B-But what he said..." Toko spoke for the first time today, her usual stuttering words an even greater mess as her anxiety shot through the room. "He might not n-necessarily be wrong. I mean," she swallowed with great difficulty, her figure beginning to tremble alongside her voice. "Can you s-say for sure someone _won't_ poison our f-food?"

"Hey, come on! You too, Toko?" Aoi complained, frustrated by how easily her mind gave into Byakuya's jeers.

"I-It's not like anyone would care i-if I disappeared anyway!" Toko continued to ramble, her shaky voice growing louder and louder with her increasing worry and despair. "In fact, y-you all think I'm d-disgusting! You w-want me gone!"

"N-No, no one's saying that..." I tried to comfort her with as much reassurance I could muster, but she ignored my feeble attempts.

"I can t-tell! I can tell from y-your eyes!" She shrieked out an excuse of an elaboration, before turning on her heel to race out of the room.

My eyes widened at her sudden rush, and I called out after her, "Hey, Toko! Wait!"

"Just let her go," Celeste chuckled, deliberately watching as the library doors slammed shut for the second time that day. "Once she gets going like that, there is nothing you can say to bring her back."

I frowned, reluctantly lowering my outstretched arm and gazing at the doors with a deep, defeated sigh. From behind the exit, I could hear Toko's rapid footsteps gradually fade away in the distance as she ran further and further from us, to where, I hadn't a single clue. All I could do was to let her go, and stand still in a wave of my own depressing thoughts.

Byakuya's way of thinking was far beyond my level of comprehension, and even had the capability to manipulate and trick others into believing it. No matter how much I tried to understand, I just couldn't. There was no way on Earth I could ever possibly think of ideas to kill and betray my own friends. In a situation like this, working alone was a suicide, as if you were asking for people to launch an attack on you. 

But for Byakuya, it was simply his lifestyle. He was raised from birth to work independent of others, carrying his pride and legacy all on his own. He couldn't possibly side with others, not even if it meant a matter of life or death. Perhaps he was cautious, maybe a little too cautious, or maybe, he was just arrogant. Whatever the case was, it was far different from my understanding, and it frustrated me how cocky and rude he could get sometimes.

Yet it wasn't our difference in thinking that disturbed me the most, rather, his twisted mind and view of the killing game. It was just that to him: a game. A game meant to entertain and challenge him, which was why he commanded us to try harder and raise the stakes a little. It was like he was trying to set up the difficulty level, because he was so keen that he would still emerge victorious at the end. 

Because he was so egotistic, because he was so independent, he saw that this killing school life was just another game for him to win. His entire life as the Ultimate Affluent Progeny had shaped and molded his mind into thinking he could and will beat every obstacle that dared to stand in his way. He couldn't afford to ever lose, as it would hurt his rising ego far too much, and he would have to win, no matter the cost.

Even if it meant sacrificing and taking lives to aid his victory, he would do it.

Even if it meant hurting others, he would do it.

The urgent stream of my swarming thoughts halted for a brisk moment of air as the realization crept up from behind me.

I was afraid.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kind of a rushed ending but its ok


	6. Chapter Five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Secrets are just truths untold.

I couldn't help but feel we were short in number during breakfast the next day.

Perhaps it was the daunting silence that engulfed all of us, or the nervous energy bouncing inside the room, but whatever it was, it formed a tight feeling of worry inside my stomach, which made it near impossible to eat. After a few failed attempts of consuming food, I set my silver spoon down on my still full plate with a defeated sigh, glancing around the room.

The hall felt strangely larger than when I had first entered, stretching up high above my head, and expanding wider than man could measure. As I turned my head to both sides, thoroughly examining the room, I pondered why the room felt bigger to me. 

Was it the small number of people? Or was it the uncomfortable quietness? I did not know for certain, but I had a feeling it was a mixture of both.

Kiyotaka seemed to have the same thoughts as I did, as he painfully tried to break the silence by speaking up. "Is this...everyone?" His eyes darted from one end of the table to the other, narrowed in concern. "It feels a little...small."

I did a mental head count of all the people who were present that morning. I was quite surprised to end up with the number ten, including myself. Compared to our original group of fifteen, ten seemed far too little, especially since only a few days had passed. 

I immediately discarded Leon, Makoto, and Sayaka, as the three of them were dead. Leaving me with a supposed number of twelve participants, I counted everybody who sat in the dining hall. 

Everybody who usually sat at the dining table were present, so I had up to ten people in my roster. When I turned my shoulder to gaze at the table for two, lying just a few feet away from the rest of the class, I saw that the two loners, Toko and Byakuya, were absent today. 

I had to admit, it wasn't too much of a surprise. After the two of them had stormed off the day before, I doubted they would greet us the next morning. And after what Byakuya had said about a chance of our food being poisoned, I imagined Toko would've taken his words to heart and decided not to take that little risk.

Even though these five missing people didn't come as a shock to me, I still couldn't stop the feeling of disbelief dash inside my body. I just didn't want to believe how many people we've lost as a group in such a short amount of time. Sighing deeply, I was forced to face the reality that my comrades had shrunk in numbers.

"I assume that is because three people are dead, and two are abstaining." responded Celeste, twirling a part of her jet black bangs around her finger. 

"Yeah," I reluctantly agreed, my voice a lot hoarser than it normally was. "With five people missing, I guess it _would_ feel kinda empty."

Aoi's face still carried a veil of worry. "Still...I know Byakuya's whatever, but shouldn't we check on Toko?"

"I vote no." Yasuhiro yawned from his end of the table, tipping his chair so that only two legs touched the floor. "She's super annoying."

"How can you be so cold?" Celeste let the strand of hair she had previously been playing with fall limp against her cheek. "You are like a piece of rock candy."

"What?" Kiyotaka was clearly puzzled by her odd choice of insult. "No, rock candy isn't cold! It's sweet!"

"Wait, is she calling me sweet?" Yasuhiro sat back up in his chair with a grin stretched on his face. "Wow, thanks, dude!"

From my left, Mondo shook his head, grumbling something incomprehensible beneath his breath. "Anyway," he cleared his throat to disrupt the arising bicker. "Byakuya's the real problem. If we don't keep an eye on him, he might really kill someone. You can see it in his eyes, he's definitely out for blood."

"Yeah..." Aoi murmured, scratching the back of her nape as her gaze dropped to the ground. "He was kinda scary yesterday."

Mondo stood up from his seat abruptly, making me flinch from the nearby cacophony that followed. "Then we got no choice!" He declared, slamming both palms against the marble tabletop. Multiple people joined me in wincing at that. "Get some rope! We're gonna have to tie him up before he kills anyone!"

I was sure a look of bewilderment and concern was drawn upon my perplexed face. "I think that's going a little overboard..." I muttered my input, but he seemed to have not heard.

"What kind of an idea is that?" Kiyotaka demanded, arising from his chair as well to face the taller man. The backs of his knees knocked into the edge of his seat, nudging the chair backwards. "If you want to keep someone restrained, at least do it civilized!"

"What do you mean "civilized"?" Mondo's voice only grew higher in terms of volume. "What, you think I'm just gonna put him in time out or some shit? Idiot!"

Kiyotaka gasped out loud, his eyes widening in true horror. It was as if Mondo had just cursed his entire bloodline by saying those mere words. "I-I'm not an idiot! _You_ are!"

"Who you callin' stupid?" As the two of them continued to argue through deafening yells, their roaring voices soared above my head, piercing my poor eardrums. I could not last even five seconds standing in between their screaming, and I rushed out from my seat to stand on the opposite side of the table, a sigh of annoyance slipping my lips. 

From my new position, different people now surrounded me on both sides. To my right, Aoi, shaking her head in deep disappointment and muttering something about boys being boys. To my left, Chihiro, her dainty head hung in a gloomy melancholy as she picked apathetically at her food.

Noticing her bleak, ashen face, I immediately asked, "Chihiro, are you okay?"

She waved me off with a hand, wiping a hand across her teary eyes when she replied, "Oh, I'm just going through a little...self loathing."

I blinked vigorously, caught off guard by her answer. "Huh? Self loathing?"

"Well, after what Byakuya said to me yesterday," Chihiro sniffed, her voice so soft, I almost couldn't hear it, even when I leaned in. "I just got so nervous, I froze up. I couldn't say anything, so Mondo ended up having to help me out. And even _he_ said I was someone who "can't fight back"..." When she pulled her hand away from her face, I could see a faraway, misty look etched in her gaze. "I...I hate how weak I am."

Aoi, who was standing next to me all along, somehow heard our entire conversation. She groaned, shooting a dreary, pointed glare towards Mondo. "Ah, I see. So Mondo made you depressed."

"What?" Mondo paused his argument with Kiyotaka for a brief moment to respond to her accusation. "How is it _my_ fault? I wasn't tryin' to be mean! Besides, girls are just naturally weak anyway, right?"

By some means, his words of defense ended up upsetting Chihiro even further, as silent tears began to well up and trace her face. I wasn't the best at comforting people, and there wasn't much I could do anyway, but no matter, I tried to give her a reassuring pat on the shoulder. Unfortunately, it resulted in being rather awkward, and I wasn't even sure if I helped at all.

Mondo flinched at her reaction, his eyes growing wide in sheer disbelief at what he had just done. "H-Hey, are you...crying?"

Aoi merely rolled her eyes, crossing her arms firmly across her chest. "It's cause you were screaming like a lunatic! You totally scared her."

Chihiro showed no signs of acknowledgement to either person, and continued to shakily wipe away fresh tears from her eyes. With a trembling hand, she softly nudged my arm away, and I retreated it with no hesitation, not wanting to make her uncomfortable. Instead, I stood sheepishly next to Aoi, shooting each other with looks of concern as Chihiro continued to silently weep.

"Hey, c'mon, don't cry," Mondo tried, his voice grower softer than I had ever heard it. "I-It's my fault, okay? I won't yell at you anymore, alright? Promise?"

Aoi huffed, her arms remaining crossed as she said, "Really? Not sure if I can believe that..."

"J-Just shut up," he snapped, and Aoi shook her head once again. Mondo gently made his away to across the table, where a small circle began to form around Chihiro's small, quivering figure. He kneeled in front of her, a sincere, gentle look of apology stretched across his face. "I'll promise, okay? I'll make you a promise as a man."

Chihiro parted her hands to peer down at Mondo's crouched form with watery eyes. "Promise...as a man?" She repeated slowly, her voice still shaking from raw emotion.

Mondo nodded. "A promise as a man is a promise never to be broken," he explained as Chihiro blinked away her fading tears. "Ever since I was a kid, my brother kept telling me that over and over again. No matter what, a real man _always_ keeps his promises. That's what he left me."

"Left you...?" Hifumi, who was far away from all the commotion, heard his story and had the nerve to question.

The once soft gaze in Mondo's lavender eyes darkened and hardened into something unrecognizable by man. "Oh yeah..." he swallowed, dropping his head the slightest, no longer looking into Chihiro's eyes. "My brother's dead."

My eyes widened instinctively at his response. I was expecting anything except that; maybe his brother moved away to another country years ago, or ran away from the rest of the gang. I never would have imagined that Mondo's brother, who was once the leader of the Crazy Diamonds, who had supposedly resigned from that position, would've been dead.

How could he have kept it as a secret for so long? How could he even live a normal life after that? I couldn't possible dream of a world where you would have to wake up every day, and face the fact that your blood sibling was gone forever. It felt too surreal, and it terrified me to my maximum.

For some unexplained reason, I felt a rush of pure, raw despair chase through my body, turning my face warm with emotion. I did not know why, or even how, but somehow, I felt his misery. If I were in his shoes, and had to live a life without my twin sister, Mukuro, I don't think I would have lasted very long. It would mean nobody to chat with late at night, nobody to send funny pictures to, nobody to make me smile. I was deeply impressed at how Mondo could hold himself together, even with his brother gone.

"Anyway," the aforementioned awkwardly said, clearing his throat to shatter the depressing cloud of silence that swarmed the whole dining hall. "I don't want to talk about it. Don't wanna make you guys cry!"

He lifted his head once again to regain eye contact with Chihiro, and offered her a smile. "Anyway, so you can trust me when I make that promise. So you don't gotta cry anymore!"

Chihiro nodded her head, a timid smile forming on her lips as well. Her cheeks were rosy and her tears finally seemed to have stopped. "Thank you...Mondo."

"S-Sure." Mondo looked away with pink cheeks of his own.

"But," Chihiro added, her tone soft and meek. "I still don't like how I am right now. I have to get stronger..."

"Huh?" I blinked at her dismissive answer. "Why? You don't have to change."

"I want to," persisted Chihiro, some sort of a firmness in her voice as she elaborated. "If I'm so weak anything can make me cry...that's not good."

I frowned, straightening my once bent back with eyebrows furrowed in deep concern. "Still, don't stress out too much about having to get stronger," I reminded. "Don't pressure yourself, okay?"

She nodded at my affirmations, a hopeful look of wonder glazing her hazel eyes. "I'll start small, then gradually get stronger. Maybe I should start working out..."

Sakura, who had also found her way to join our side of the table, smiled at that response. "In that case, I would be happy to help you out anytime."

Hifumi gasped, his face paling instantaneously at Sakura's rather kind offer. "B-But then, Miss Fujisaki would get smashed into a billion pieces!" 

Aoi rolled her eyes, shooting him down with a piercing glare. "Shut up, you." She snapped.

Seeing all this lighthearted commotion around her, Chihiro managed a blithe giggle, a smile creeping up on her face.

"Oh, finally cracked a smile, huh?" Yasuhiro teased, cracking an easygoing grin himself as he leaned back in his chair. 

"Yeah," Chihiro nodded, roses of blush blooming against the pale skin of her cheeks. She looked quite genuine and grateful for our comfort, which made my heart swell far past its limits in satisfaction. "Everyone, thank you."

As our pleasant reassurances and sprightly teasing were exchanged, I found myself managing a smile as well. Something about the light, lively atmosphere of surrounding myself with friends, made my moral boost through the roof. Saying I was joyful in that split moment was a clear understatement; I was so relieved, so glad, that I no longer felt doubt nor fear dwelling inside my bones.

This was what our teamwork was supposed to be like during the very first day. Comrades supporting and laughing and helping each other during times of desperation, working together to combat inner and outer demons, was what we all needed in a situation like this. If this continued for more days, perhaps even weeks, to come, then I was almost certain we could escape this school of despair together. Our combined hope was fated to overcome any despair.

Still, all of the hope in the world could not stop me from worrying about the two who refused to show: Toko and Byakuya. Even long after breakfast ended, they still made no attempts to join the rest of us. Something told me it was not the paranoia of poisoned food keeping them afar, but rather, our mere presence. Were they really risking to be that far from the rest of us?

No matter how negative I twisted my view onto the situation, it never seemed to match up theirs. I couldn't pretend and say I understood what they were thinking, but somehow, I couldn't help but feel that a little part of me agreed with their precautions. I despised the sour feeling I got whenever I thought about treachery, and tried to stray away from that as much as possible.

Yet, breakfast that day still ended on a high note, and I found myself forgetting my worries for that brief moment. The warm, light atmosphere that morning was enough to melt away my concerns, and for the first time since the Class Trial, I found hope living inside of me. The thermal feeling of burning hope inside my chest felt rather odd during a time like this, and I wondered whether or not I truly deserved it. 

This sensation dwelled inside my body, thriving in my veins and heating up my heart. It remained deep within me, even long after our little group had dispersed into individual activities. When I departed the dining hall, the air engulfing the chilling hallways no longer felt icy on my skin.

Now on my own, I pondered what I could possibly do in my free time. It wasn't like I could go browsing on the Internet; all and any electronics that could be found in any regular school were either confiscated or broken, forcing me to live a life without the modern world. I didn't have any school work to complete either; even though I was physically inside the academy, it seemed my only homework was to try my best to survive. My options were quite limited here in Hope's Peak, I realized with a frown. I turned my shoulder a bit to gaze behind me, wondering whether or not I should just sleep it out in my room, when a sudden epiphany came across my mind.

The second floor. It was now open, right? There should be plenty of recreational things to do up there.

Having a vague idea on what I was planning to do, I pivoted on the toe of my boot to turn back to where I originally was, and began to search for the newly opened stairwell lurking somewhere on the first floor.

Everybody else seemed to have gone separate directions, because the hallways I slithered into were completely empty, devoid of sound and movement. What used to once terrify me, now gave me comfort, as I felt more eased inside this still silence of sorts. It was almost reassuring, and while I didn't quite know why, I accepted the great offer. 

I climbed the stairs with quite a bit of haste, not as much as the first time I went up, but still at a pace not too suitable for walking. My footsteps were soft paddings against the smooth, hard tiles of the stairs, gradually fading in volume as I travelled higher up the floor. My hand slid up the icy, metal railing, guiding and stabilizing my steps.

When I finally reached the top of the stairwell, I retracted my hand and felt a slight dull, greasy feeling latch onto the skin of my palm, possibly from the old metal bar. Wiping it off on the fabric of my skirt, and making a mental note to bring my set of clothes into the laundromat again, I shuffled further down into the pale, blue lit halls. 

As I cautiously made my travel to the end of the cyan hallway, I had a random, useless wonder clutter my mind: Why were the hallways of this school so oddly colored? For a high school, especially a prestigious one like Hope's Peak, the corridors appeared rather odd, and even uncomfortable, for the dwellers. Black and white checkered floors, dark ceilings, vibrant walls, it all seemed like something straight from a movie. How did the previous students of Hope's Peak feel when they were attending class here, and walking down these strange hallways? 

Perhaps, this was also the work of the mastermind. If they had gotten complete control on the academy after it shut down, then they would've also had the power to modify the school too, right? I had already been witness to several of Monokuma's additions to the building, like the trial grounds, the elevator, and more. It wouldn't be impossible to say that he was responsible for tweaking the hallways into a creepier atmospheric place.

These thoughts stuck with me like glue to tissue paper, especially when I entered the pink hall. The light was much duller here, like a maroon, or magenta. I did a quick scan of the corridor, checking if anybody was there with me. There was nobody hiding behind the tall pillars, nobody swaying in the moonless corners of the room, so I assumed I was alone again. That realization disturbed me; I felt as if every time I stepped out to search the school on my own, everybody just vanished. I'd yet to come across somebody during my individual expeditions.

I brushed it off in dismissal, scolding myself for being a bit too paranoid, and walked over to the double oak doors of the school library. I knew exactly who would be in there: Byakuya, for certain, and possibly Toko as well, as she clung to him wherever he went. Even so, I reached to open the door, my hand grasping the handle firmly. 

My plan was to just drop in, maybe say a greeting or two, find a book, and leave. It was a simple minded plan, and I stuck with it until the moment I yanked open the doors. 

Exactly as I had imagined, there sat Byakuya, in the same seat as yesterday, a desk lamp providing his eyes with warm light, reading the same novel as before. His eyes traced the sentences at the top of the page, then to the bottom, then to the top again, before falling to the last few phrases. The room was dead silent, other than the occasional soft page flip of the book when he ran out of words to read. 

I had also expected to see Toko, hiding behind one of the four wooden pillars extending from the floor to the ceiling. She was hunched, as if she were trying to duck behind the column for protection. Although, half of her shoulder was peeking out from behind the pillar, and I got the feeling that she was indeed stalking him. Whether or not Byakuya had the knowledge of this, I couldn't tell from his face of stone, unmoving with any signs of emotion. 

Those two, I had predicted would be in the library during this time. But who I didn't expect to see was Chihiro, flipping through a thick textbook whose cover I could not read, in front of one of the large bookshelves. 

I had never seen Chihiro go into the library on her own free will, and it shocked me to the extent where I felt the need to go and talk to her. My footsteps were cautious, soft, as I tried to slink over to the bookshelf without provoking Byakuya.

"Hey," Chihiro flinched and snapped her head around, jumpy from my whisper of a greeting. I offered her a wave and a smile, which she warmly reciprocated. 

"Hi, Junko," our voices were low and hushed beneath our breaths as we conversed in front of the shelf. "What're you doing here?"

I tried to squint past the dim lighting of the library and narrow my gaze onto one of the many books sheathed in the shelf beside us. "I got bored, so I was looking for a book," I tilted my head to look at the text held firmly in her own hands. "What are you reading?"

Her cheeks were tinted pink again with sheepishness as she dropped her eyes to read the glossy, green cover. "I-It's just a book about programming."

"Wow, they have that here?" I scanned the large, thick book from front to back. Through the blinding darkness, I could barely skim the title, which was, "Computer Science and Mechanics: Vol. 2", printed in big, bold black letters. It wasn't too much of a surprise; Chihiro was the Ultimate Programmer, so it made sense she'd get a book about coding from the library. But, I wondered, what was she using it for? Mere reading and education? Or was she working on a program?

From my previous statement, she nodded with vigor. "Yeah! I was actually surprised that they have a book about coding here!" Even though her voice was a whisper, it still boasted excitement and joy at her discoveries. 

"What are you using it for?" I voiced out another question, pointing at the textbook.

"Oh, I found a-"

"If you two could please leave this area, that would be great," Byakuya rudely interrupted Chihiro before she could even go on. When I turned to see where he sat, I saw that he didn't even look up once from his novel as he spoke. "Your chatter is distracting me. Go."

"Oh, well," I forced my voice into a louder volume than before, and realized it sounded quite strange now that I spoke aloud. "My bad. Sorry."

Chihiro dropped her head in an unnecessary apology. "I-I'm sorry."

He only rolled his eyes and scoffed as we left the room by his vulgar demand. I held the heavy oak doors open for Chihiro, who thanked me silently and stepped out into the pink corridor. I let my arm fall limp against my side, and the door slammed shut cacophonously behind me.

Chihiro pressed her back against the smooth, magenta wall, and began to flip through the thick pages of the textbook once again. From the way her eyes flickered from one paragraph to the other, to how she murmured soundless phrases with her lips, I could tel she was deeply immersed in the subject.

In fact, she was so immersed, that I felt regret split my skin as soon as I began talking again. "So, back in the library, you said you found something?"

At my voice, her head perked up with interest, and she looked glad that I remembered our previous conversation. "Oh yeah! I found this broken laptop in there the other day, and I tried to tinker with it so I can get it on. That's why I picked up this book," she held up the text for emphasis. "So I can figure out how to fix it."

"Are you trying to program something on there?" I asked, and she seemed to ponder my inquiry.

"Well, I did have something in mind," she replied, her voice steady from thought. "But I don't know if I will put the program on there yet."

"What's the program?" It already surprised me that she was trying to repair the broken laptop from earlier, but it shocked me even more to know that she was trying to code something onto there. With so scarce technology, this school was a living hell. There was no access to the online world, no entertainment, nothing that could potentially aid us in escape. But perhaps, would the program Chihiro had in mind help us?

"Actually, I just started the research process for something," she began to elaborate. I couldn't help but notice how much more confidence she had in her speech once she began to talk about her true passion. "But I signed an NDA with the company that hired me for work, so I can't really go into the details."

I nodded to show my understanding. "Yeah, it'd be better if the wrong people don't hear about this."

"But," she closed the book, and the pages released a cloud of grey dust from the impact. She looked up at me with a slight smile, a proud one. "I can give you a little hint."

"Hint?" I echoed her words unintelligently, blinking at her offer. 

"It's a kind of database software," she explained, turning the textbook around in her hands in a fidget. "Except it's a bit more complex, and it has to do with simulating human thoughts."

Simulating human thoughts. I had a hunch on what it could be, but I couldn't say for sure. I wasn't exactly the best with computers; if my laptop ever crashed, or had an issue, I'd just go and get it fixed by a professional, or abandon the computer completely. Every time I tried to fix the problem on my own, I ended up making it worse, so it's safe to say my computer skills weren't exceptional.

"Is it..." my voice trailed off with doubt. "Artificial intelligence?"

Her eyes grew wide with bewilderment, and I got the sense that I was right on the money. Her hands stopped playing with the book, and her words were heavy with concern.

"Y-You figured it out?" I instantly felt guilt for answering so recklessly, and thought that it probably would've been better if I had said nothing at all. "Was my hint too easy? If they find out I broke my promise, they might..."

"D-Don't worry!" I tried to reassure her, panic seeping into my skin. "It's not your fault. I won't say anything to anyone, I swear."

She seemed to loosen up at my words, and her shoulders relaxed from their previous tension. She sighed, clutching the book close to her chest. "I...I can trust you, right?" I nodded immediately at her response, with a little too much vigor, I suppose. "Then, I guess I can tell you a bit about it."

"So, what's this artificial intelligence you've been working on?" I felt more at ease with her consent to continue questioning.

She, too, seemed more composed, as she resumed with familiarity, "Well, in the field of artificial intelligence, there's strong AI and weak AI. Weak AI isn't meant to match human intelligence. It's simply a type of problem-solving software. A weak AI isn't actually thinking; it's just executing actions programmed into it.

"Strong AI, on the other hand, is a program that can achieve true self-consciousness, or in other words, full ego awareness. Basically, a strong AI is a complete entity, a computer program capable of becoming aware. But it's always been just a hypothesis. Plenty of experts don't think it's even possible, but," she paused in her explanation to smile hesitantly up at me. "Well, I'm trying to research it right now. I've made lots of progress on the programming side, and the intelligence development, but when it comes to actual awareness, it's still a long way off.

"No matter how complex or detailed a computer program is, no matter how closely the software can simulate the workings of the human brain, I don't think it's enough to fully achieve ego awareness. It's...lacking something."

I blinked, trying desperately to keep up with her complicated words and elaborations. "Lacking?"

Her eyes had a faraway look of wonder in them, clouding her gaze with thought. "Well, I guess you could say, a soul."

A soul?

"If you could somehow pour your own soul into the software," she continued, her voice just a bit softer than before. "Then maybe a strong AI could be created."

I've never considered the possibility that one could pour their soul into a computer program. It seemed, like what Chihiro said, almost impossible to do so. But even so, the idea that if a software had the soul of a human being, was certainly one I understood. much to my surprise. If even a mechanical robot had a soul of their own, then they could easily be treated just like a human. Acting, thinking, speaking, all like a human. That would be the most powerful thing a programmer could achieve.

"I'm only researching that aspect," Chihiro said, opening and closing the book in her palms. "But I feel really motivated to make one. I want to create a strong AI that can replicate a human's mind, and maybe, even aid us in our situation here. So, that's why I'm trying to get my hands on that computer."

With only one look at her face, I could tell just how passionate she was about this topic. She was so invested, so determined, and I admired that quite a lot. From the assurance in her voice, to her hope of achieving the near impossible, I knew she was going to reach her goal someday.

"Well," I tried, sheepish from my lack of input in the conversation. "I don't want to keep you from working. You can head back to your room and work on that laptop, if you like."

Her face brightened at the mere thought of it. "Thanks, Junko! I'll try and get started, and maybe, I can show you the program one day!"

"One day." I agreed, watching her take off for the stairs at the end of the halls. Right before she got the chance to pass into the blue tinted hallway, her steps died and halted, and she turned back to look at me one last time.

"Hey," she said, her voice gentle and wavering. Her face was rosy, and her smile was warm enough to soothe my heart. "Thanks for talking to me, Junko. I'm...really glad you decided to listen to me."

I returned her grin, giving her an embarrassed wave of dismissal. "No problem. Please tell me more about programming in the future."

With that, she let out a light giggle, waved, and was gone before I even knew it.

Now, with Chihiro gone, I had nobody left to talk with. My original idea of finding and reading a book sort of backfired in a way, and there was no way in hell I would go back inside the library, where Byakuya would be distastefully waiting for me. With a hefty sigh of defeat, I departed the hall as well on heavy feet, abandoning my one and only plan.

I could not think of any other way to fill my free time at this school, so I simply continued to pace mindlessly around the school as I tried to think of any other ideas. There was nobody else hanging in the halls, which caused me to conclude that everybody else must be in their dorm rooms. Letting my own two feet carry me wherever, I took a turn to the left from the corridor, and found myself standing in front of the vibrant, violet pool doors.

Swimming at the pool did sound like a great plan to excuse time, but alas, I didn't have any swimsuits on me at the moment. Even though there was an olympic sized pool at our availability, we weren't provided with any materials to actually use the facility. Nevertheless, I stretched out my hand to pull the doors open anyway, too desperate to check out anything else of interest.

I was instantly greeted with the cheerful, saturated green color of the pool foyer's walls. The room was in the exact condition as it was the day before, so nothing must have been touched recently. The colorful pool noodles remained stacked nicely to my right, the swimming ropes were coiled tightly in circular bundles, and the kick boards were neatly folded on top of one another. Even the Gatling gun, which still hung from the ceiling, aimed and ready to strike in front of the girls locker room, seemed unused, which set me in great relief. 

I ducked my head underneath the long, heavy muzzle of the gun, careful not to graze even the slightest bit of its steel surface, and reached inside the pocket of my cardigan in search of my e-handbook. I felt the cool, solid edges of the electronica brush against my fingers, their iciness chilling the warmth of my touch and sending waves of shock through my arm. Slipping the handbook out, I extended my arm, still keeping my head low from the menacing glare of the Gatling gun, and swiped the surface of the device against the blank face of the card reader. It beeped once, flashing a tiny, circular green light, and I heard the locker room door unlock with a quiet click.

Tucking the gadget back into my jacket, I grasped the frigid metal handle of the door with my hand, and pulled it open with a mighty yank. The now open door revealed the inside of the girls locker room, and I stepped inside with caution, closing the door noiselessly behind me. The heels of my platform boots clanked against the wooden floors of the changing room without fail, and I pushed past the lockers and exercise equipment and poster to arrive at the pool door. I figured it wouldn't hurt to take a look, so I pulled it open as well.

The intense smell of chlorine immediately engulfed me, and I was yet again thrown into deep awe at the size of the swimming pool. The hall was so tall, extending to a height measureless by man, and so vast, it could fit an airplane. The white and blue paint of the walls clashed and blended together nicely, in a pure, aesthetic manner. The pool water glistened turquoise beneath the florescent overhead lights. Simply put, the pool was beautiful.

However, there was an addition to the pool between the time I visited it yesterday, to today. Standing beside a set of vacant bleachers, was Aoi, to no surprise. From the way she was talking about the pool so eagerly last night, it was inevitable that she'd be here. Seeing her presence, I brightened at once and made my way over.

"Hey, Junko!" She spotted me right away, and waved to me from her position. There was a smile on her face as she greeted me with affability. 

"Hi, Aoi," I said, slowing my jog so I could stand next to her. "What's up?"

She sighed, and drooped her shoulders unexpectedly at my question. "I need to move." She sounded as if she was admitting defeat, to who, I didn't know. Her voice was laced with frustration, and pent up, wasted energy. "If I don't exercise, I'm gonna shrivel up one day and die! I gotta do something!"

"S-Shrivel up and die?" I repeated in wide eyed disbelief, caught off guard by her sudden confession.

Aoi nodded glumly in a vanquished agreement. "I like moving my body, you know? I can't stand staying still."

I gazed over the glassy, gentle waves of the pool, watching as the water lapped at the sides of the pool with little effort at all. "Have you tried swimming here yet?"

At this, she shook her head, appearing even more dispirited than before. "I don't have a swimming suit, and I haven't really thought of an alternative yet."

I tried to think of as many ways she could exercise while being simultaneously trapped inside a school building. "Hmm, do you want to take a walk around the school? Hopefully, that can get you going."

Her demeanor switched from depressed to energized in a matter of seconds, and it was hard to believe somebody could switch moods like that so quickly. "Ooh! That's a great idea! Let's do it!"

With a newfound vitality, she brushed past me and hurried over to the pool doors, sprinting all fifty meters and leaving me in her dust to catch up. I didn't match her pace until we were out the door, and into the dim, bright blue hallway, where she had finally slowed down a bit for the two of us to regroup. 

Watching me pant out of mere exhaustion, Aoi crossed her arms and frowned. "Wow, Junko. I didn't know you were so out of shape."

"I-I'm not!" I tried to defend myself, straightening my back and brushing my fingertips against my wind ruffled hair. "You're just...fast."

Aoi shrugged it off, accepting the compliment without complaint. "It was only fifty meters anyway. I can't do long distance, 'cause then I start to get hungry."

I'm certain there was a veil of visible confusion draped across my face as I repeated, "Hungry? In that time?"

"People say I have super fast metabolism," Aoi elaborated, beginning to pick up her feet and walk further down into the hall. I trailed after her, despite my lack of recovery from the previous run. "That's why I get so hungry sometimes. Even after I eat, I still feel hungry! But I'm tryna eat less because gaining weight is a huge no-no as an athlete."

We fell into a comfortable walking pace, ambling side by side as we turned and trampled the halls. The colors splashed onto the walls melted from blue to green to pink, basically the entire rainbow. Our footsteps were not too loud, yet not too silent either, as they were quickly drowned by our continuous chatter. Our conversations fell from one topic to the next, the transitions scarily smooth. She and I roamed the entirety of the second floor, trying fruitlessly to open locked doors and peeping into empty, abandoned classrooms.

Most of the lecture rooms were moonless, dusty, as if nobody had paid a visit there for quite some time. That observation puzzled me, as I believed Hope's Peak Academy was just up and running the year before. In fact, when we all first arrived here, it was our supposed first day of school. Why were all the rooms dirty and musty with age, if they were meant to be used by staff and students? Perhaps, there was a bigger truth that laid behind these numberless theories and questions I had, and I just didn't know it yet. 

Alongside all the debris and dust that piled itself in corners of each room, all of the classrooms we dared to visit had strange, and frankly rather scary, drawings and messages scrawled on the deteriorating blackboards. They resembled the graffiti I found the day before, where it depicted a poorly drawn figure of Monokuma, alongside a vulgar, offensive comment to the reader. The room we entered this time was no exception.

Aoi reached out for another handle, and jiggled the door until it swung open under her force. Inside, was a classroom like any other. I poked my head through the gaping doorway, scanning the entirety of the room for any cautions, before finally stepping inside fully. 

The walls were a vibrant, painful neon green, with blue polka dots embedding the wallpaper. An odd choice of design for a school like this, I thought, but brushed the thought aside. Identical to all the other classrooms we searched, there were neat yet dirty rows of desks, their chairs pushed in and perfectly in line with one another. There was a clock at the front of the room, hanging just above the teacher's podium, alongside another blank monitor that displayed itself right in front of the class. In the corner of the room, a security camera dangled from the ceiling, poised and aimed at the two of us, and watching our every move.

"Ugh, this classroom is super creepy," stated Aoi as she weaved through the columns of seats, her hands clutching her elbows. Her eyes were examining each dusty desktop, searching for anything worthy of note. 

"All the classrooms are creepy," I agreed, pushing past the chairs to swerve my way to the front of the classroom. "Why are they all so...old?"

"Yeah, that's totally weird." I heard Aoi say from somewhere inside the chilling room. "I bet it's the mastermind's doing."

I didn't know if she could even see, but I nodded wordlessly in concurrence as I cautiously stepped over the entangled legs of the chairs and desks. Halting right in front of the teacher's desk at the front, I rested my hands on the edge of the teaching podium as I narrowed my eyes onto the chalkboard in across from me.

Again, it was a messily written message, with yet another crude drawing to accompany it. This time, the scratchy words spelt out the two worded sentence, " _LET'S LIVE_ ", with a sketch of Monokuma dressed as a priest beside it. Something about that short, simple, haunting writing chilled me to no end, shoving my heart into a much faster pace and filling my veins with dread. The irony of the entire message was perhaps the most horrifying part of it all; how could it say something as encouraging as "let's live", when three of our own friends had died already? 

It frustrated, terrified, worried, and angered me all at the same time. I could not understand anything being thrown at my direction. Was this really all just a game, like what Byakuya said? A game the mastermind runs to entertain themselves, which hides easter eggs and cruel jokes in all of its pitch black misery? 

"Yes, it is a game!"

God forbid I ever became used to that voice, because every time I heard him, I felt the animalistic urge dwelling inside me to scream and run away. The annoyingly high pitch, the way you can't even predict how he was going to enunciate the next word, all pointed to the bear himself, Monokuma.

I fought the compulsion to shriek in pure shock and terror, digging my long, deep red nails into the soft flesh of my palms. Aoi, however, was not as lucky as I, and she cried out in raw fright as she leaped back from where she was standing, falling and bumping into a few desks. 

"W-What are you doing here?" She yelled, still not over her previous alarm from his sudden appearance.

"H-How did you know what I was thinking?" I said at the exact same time, our voices blending into a harmonious cacophony of panic and fear.

Monokuma merely giggled at our reaction, raising his duo toned paws to cover his wicked mouth. "I'm psychic." He whispered with an extra load of drama, ignoring Aoi's demands and answering my question instead.

My blood froze inside my veins, and I could feel my jaw drop open in wide eyed disbelief. I knew that wasn't true, yet somehow, I still felt intimidated by his ominous response. "No way. You're not-"

"I'm kidding, I'm kidding!" Monokuma began to waddle away from where he stood, by the doorway, and strolled merrily through the countless rows of desks. "I just have good intuition."

"Wh-How did you get in here?" Aoi repeated, more infuriated this time, slowly retreating from where Monokuma was walking. The robotic bear shrugged at her inquiry and pointed a paw towards the wide open door. 

"You left it open, so I just walked on in!" He said, hobbling over to the teaching podium. I backed up a few feet, maybe even a few meters, away from Monokuma, terrified to get hurt. I watched voicelessly as he struggled to hop onto the desk, wriggling his hind legs before he finally stood flawlessly on top, striking a pose for extra effect. "Anyways, I got super bored, so how about I spend some time with you ladies?"

"Absolutely not." huffed Aoi, crossing her arms across her chest in rejection. "Go away, we never invited you."

Monokuma's head dropped in a cloy disheartening, his saddened gaze fixated firmly on the dusty tabletop. "Aw, why does no one want to hang out with me? Am I _that_ annoying?"

"Please, just go." I pleaded in my fatigued voice, hopelessly watching as he merely waved off our demands like pesky fruit flies.

"But you didn't say anything about my drawing!" He complained loudly, pointing at the chalkboard behind him with a whine. Sure enough, there it was: the phrase, " _LET'S LIVE_ ", scribbled in white, powdery chalk, and a self portrait of Monokuma to the side. I squinted at the board, trying to make sense out of the senseless.

I had one too many questions to ask, starting with, "Why did you write, "let's live", on the board?"

Monokuma turned his head around to glance at his own handiwork. "Well, I thought I'd liven you guys up a bit! Come on, live! Laugh! Make this game more interesting than all the depressing crap!"

I sighed, shaking my head in eventual defeat. No matter how much he elaborated on his preachings, I would never come to an understanding of that scandalous bear. It seemed that everything I deemed as good, he thought of as bad, and vice versa. Pain hurt for me, and pain healed for him. I desired a sliver of hope, he was in love with maddening despair. Just who was this psychopath anyway?

I focused my gaze solely on the writings scribbled on the scratchy, screechy green surface, trying everything and anything to avoid looking into Monokuma's beady little eyes. Yet, the longer I stared at it, the more odd and intriguing the message became. I noticed even the tiniest details with my poorly sighted eyes. The letters seemed a little _too_ deformed, the handwriting purposely atrocious. It was like someone wanted to make it look horrid intentionally, but what did they gain from doing so?

"Laugh?" Aoi's shouts of vexation cut cleanly through my thoughts, piercing the hazy cloud of subconsciousness that draped over my shoulders. "How are we supposed to laugh in a place like this?"

An annoyed, hefty sigh left Monokuma, as if he were greatly disappointed by our antics. "Well, if you wanna be sad your entire life, then be sad! As your headmaster, I'm just trying to help you!"

"Well, you can help us by leaving us alone." I retorted, pointing a finger towards the gaping doorway. "Go. Please, you're starting to annoy me."

"No."

Aoi groaned out loud, her voice fueled with exasperation and testiness. She uncrossed her arms, letting them fall to her sides, and shot an infuriated glare right at Monokuma's face, who simply tilted his head to the side. "Fine, then _I'm_ going. Come on Junko, let's get outta here. Bye bye, boring Monokuma."

Without waiting for any sort of reply from the bear, she stormed out of the blinding, vibrant classroom, leaving me behind alone to deal with him.

"How rude." Monokuma muttered beneath his breath, his left eye glowering a familiar shade of crimson. He shook his head, disheartened at the very least, and then raised his chin to look at me, daring me to do the same. From up top the podium, he looked more menacing than ever, despite being only two feet tall. His jagged, wicked smile appeared more gruesome than before, and his eyes were a crude mix of pure light and pitch darkness.

I swallowed a lump gathering inside my throat, more intimidated now that I was on my own. Did I dare to step outside the classroom with a harsh remark just like Aoi did? I felt my fingers shakily work their way to the hem of my pleated skirt, rubbing and playing with the thin fabric out of raw trepidation. An eerie, uncomfortable, crushing silence fell upon the two of us, and it appeared I had run out of options.

"W-Well," I couldn't force myself to make any sort of eye contact with Monokuma, so I simply stared off into the space beside him. "I'm gonna get going too, I guess."

Monokuma was silent. I could not tell whether or not he was angry with me, and I did not dare to test it out.

"See you." My words were a jumbled, rushed mess, as I did not want to spend a second longer with Monokuma inside this creepy classroom. I managed a meek wave of sorts, which he did not return, before whipping my back around and making a run for the doors. My heart was ramming against my ribcage, like a hammer destroying stone, as I stumbled and tripped through the maze of endless desks. I didn't once look back, not when I was out the creaky door, not when I was sprinting down the rainbow stained halls, not even when I was on the first floor. I didn't need to look back to remember what his face looked like.

Somehow, I knew I would never forget.

*

I'll admit, after locking myself inside my room for eight hours, I was getting rather hungry. 

After my run in with Monokuma that morning, I was terrified of ever escaping the safety of my dorm room. Something about his sudden plead for silence chilled me to the core, leaving an iciness I could never seem to shake off, no matter how hard I tried. I was beyond worried that if I stepped out at any given time, Monokuma would pounce on me for unknowingly upsetting him earlier. In fact, I was so distressed, that I didn't even come out to eat lunch. Needless to say, I was starving and food deprived when nighttime hit.

Sighing for the nth time that day, I peeled the one of the two rubber bands off of my sore wrist while sitting on the edge of my bed. Tousling my thick, wavy, strawberry blond hair, previously let loose from earlier today, I bunched up all of the tangled, matted locks in one hand, and twisted the entirety of my hair into a high ponytail with the other. It was already late in the day, and I didn't plan on going out for long, so instead of doing my usual hairstyle for the day, I pulled all of my hair back into a simpler ponytail. I let the longer strands of hair at the front hang out from underneath the hair band, curling against the sides of my cheekbones. Brushing back my bangs with a single hand, I stood up from the bed, straightening my aching back with a stifled yawn of sorts. 

I stretched my stiff limbs for a brief minute, adjusting the hair tie holding my hair together one last time. I nudged the two clips buried in my ponytail closer together, so that they would sit right next to each other on either side of the ponytail. Checking up on any last flaws in my full body length mirror, I smoothed down my cardigan and left the room.

Sure enough, when I cracked my door open with a quiet, cautious creak, I saw that there was nobody dwelling inside the halls. It was around eight or nine in the evening, just a few hours before "nighttime" officially began at this school. It made sense for no one to be out in the corridors at this hour, so I closed my door behind me without much concern. I figured I would just make a quick stop at the dining hall, pick out a snack to take back to my dorm, and eat it there on my own. Repeating this simple plan inside my head for more times than necessary, I tiptoed down the vivid red hallway, trying my best to conceal any sounds that indicated movement.

Once I was in front of the cafeteria, I reached out a hand to slowly grasp the door handles and pull the doorway open. The metal was cool against the warmth of my palms, not enough to freeze, but certainly far less than tepid. Using a small jerk of my shoulder, I yanked the doors open.

Since it was so late in the day, I expected nobody else to be here other than myself. However, what I saw in reality was clearly contradicting all of my expectations.

Out of all the people that could have been there, the last ones I were expecting were Mondo and Kiyotaka, standing worlds apart from each other, arms crossed and shouting fits of rage at one another.

My steps faltered in their path, and I stopped dead with a sudden regret of ever stepping into the room. It appeared I had just waltzed in on a heated debate between the two, as they exchanged looks of fury, and shot remarks that were anything but pure. As soon as I had stepped foot into the dining hall, both of them froze mid-argument to to whip their heads around and glare at me.

"Hey, Junko!" Kiyotaka called from his position, arms still crossed in a bitter malice. Even though his words were addressed to me, it didn't stop him from pelting Mondo with a shower of razor sharp scowls. "Perfect timing!"

Afraid I had just walked in on a full blown fight, I managed out, "H-Huh? What's going on?"

"Lend us a hand, won'tcha?" growled Mondo, reciprocating Kiyotaka's hurricane of dirty looks as he gritted his teeth. "We need a witness."

I blinked vigorously, deeply puzzled by his request. "Witness to what?" I echoed his words unintelligently. 

Mondo scoffed, jabbing a finger of accusation at Kiyotaka's direction. "This guy's been talkin' shit about me since day one," he snarled out an explanation, his voice dripping venom and hatred toward the other party. "Callin' me a coward and shit like that."

"You _are_ a coward!" Kiyotaka retaliated, fighting back against the allegations. He thrust his index finger right back at Mondo, and the two were in a viscous point-off of accusations. "That's why you turn to violence to solve your problems! That's why you can't do what society asks of you, why you walk around dressed like that!"

"The fuck you just say?" snapped Mondo, clenching his fist until the veins on the back of his hands popped out due to sheer rage. "You dunno shit!"

Kiyotaka had even more to say. "You've already lost to yourself, but you're such a coward, you don't even realize it!"

This was what seemed to tip Mondo off the edge, as he dug his nails deeper into his palm and yelled, "So what, you're sayin' you're _not_ a coward? You think you're tougher than me?"

"I _know_ I am!" Kiyotaka stepped a few paces closer towards Mondo, until they were merely centimeters apart, breathing and screaming in each other's red tinted faces. I felt a familiar knot of trepidation curl up inside my empty stomach, and I worried about what was about to ensue.

"Okay, then let's throw down!" Mondo barked, shoving his face closer to Kiyotaka's until the end of his long, permed hair pushed up against the other's forehead. There was an undoubted look of pure fury rising unrestfully in his eyes, firing up the flames of raw competition and anger. "Prove you got what I don't got!"

Kiyotaka, despite being pressed up so close against Mondo's taught, enraged face, showed absolutely no signs of backing down. "I accept your challenge!" He declared with much confidence.

"So," Mondo peeled himself away from Kiyotaka for a brief moment to glare at me right in the eye, and I felt myself flinch at such mutual hostility sparkling in the air at once. "That's what's happen', Junko. You gotta be our witness!"

The gnawing sensation of dread and worry mixed together became too great to silently bear, so I tried to voice some of my concerns out loud. "You're gonna...throw down?" My eyes widened in realization as I recalled his previous statements. "You're not gonna, like, start punching each other, are you?"

Mondo scoffed once again, now focusing his piercing, unwavering stare at Kiyotaka on his right. "There's a bathhouse on the first floor of the dorms, right? With a sauna inside?"

A knowing, smug smile stretched its way onto Kiyotaka's lips. "I see! A simple endurance contest, is it? We're going to see who can stay in the sauna the longest, am I right?"

"Goddamn straight!" From the way he so strenuously said it, Mondo's agreement sounded more like a rebuttal.

"W-Wait, why am I getting looped into this?" I tried to protest, waving my hands in the air in front of me in a futile attempt of dismissal. "Why not ask one of the other guys, or-"

"In a battle between men, only a woman can decide the winner!" Mondo answered for me, shooting a pointed look of challenge towards Kiyotaka, who gladly did the same back. "Don't you know that saying from the olden days?"

"No, not really-"

"Alright, then!" Kiyotaka announced, clenching his fist as a sign of power. "Let's go to the bathhouse!"

"Wait, I-" I began, but before I could even finish my meager sentence, the two were already trampling out the door, shoving each other aside and bickering to no end. And without thinking it over even once, my legs carried me in order to chase after them, worried about what might happen if there was no chaperone. 

I had forgotten all about my original plan of getting a late night snack, as now, I was currently running down a pair of fiercely competitive men who just so happened to be my classmates. As I forced my way through the halls this time, my steps were rushed and clumsy with unsettlement.

I trailed them all the way into the white hall of the cafeteria and dashed right across the vast corridor, finding myself in the proclaimed bathhouse which I had never bothered to look inside of before. Once stumbling and pushing myself through the doorway, my wide eyes drank in all of the new features of the unfamiliar room.

The walls of the bathhouse were tall, sleek and shiny from all the moisture that collectively splashed onto its sides. The small tiles that made up the mosaic of the wall were each painted a pastel peach, a color rather pleasant to the weary eye. The floors were a smooth dark oak, with inky hatches slashing through the wood to create a diamond pattern. A neat row of ivory benches stood off in the far, upper right hand corner, accompanied by a set of showers one could easily use with only a hand. Other than that, there was a large bath to my left, overflowing with warm water and ready to be occupied. Behind the pool, was a much smaller hot tub, emanating tepid steam identical to the bigger bath. And at the farthest wall to the back, was a single, pale wooden door with a simple window to gaze inside of.

Despite all of these unique, intriguing items in the bathhouse, the thing that caught my attention the most was the overwhelming temperature of the room. There was steam arising from every inch of the bathhouse, clouding up the air until it was thick with blazing, hefty heat. Just by standing there, I could already feel my skin begin to sweat from such high degrees.

I could not imagine staying in here for any longer than a minute. The heat was so intense, so profuse, that I couldn't even breathe quite right. And this was only the common area; just how high would the temperature be inside a sauna?

Wiping off a pool of sweat from my forehead, I swallowed and spoke, "A-Are you guys really gonna go through with this?"

"Shit yeah!" Mondo seemed dead set on competing with his health on the line.

"He'll be done in a matter of minutes, anyway." Kiyotaka refuted, jabbing another finger of accusation towards the taller man. "People like him are, without exception, all talk!"

Mondo lifted his arms to crack his knuckles. "Bring! It! On!" He growled, shoving his face into Kiyotaka's to declare his prowess. "Hell, let's make things interesting. Wouldn't wanna win without a challenge, right?"

I had a bad feeling about this little, "challenge" Mondo spoke of. "Interesting...?" I echoed, trying my hardest to force all of my concerns down into the deepest pit of my stomach.

"We're gonna battle with all our clothes on!" demanded Mondo, his voice rising with the intensity of the heat.

At this, Kiyotaka's eyes widened in pure horror and backed away from him. I could see the anxiety written on his face, as clear as day, when he stammered, "Th-That's idiotic! Suicidal!"

Mondo scoffed at his bewildered, wavering response, jeering at him in attempts to taunt. "What, you afraid?" He sneered.

Kiyotaka gritted his teeth, determined not to lose his nerve. "Y-You're going to regret this!"

"Then, shut up and let's do this!"

As promised, Mondo remained fully clothed before he stepped inside the sauna room. Kiyotaka, on the other hand, seemed to not desire suicide, and began to quickly undress with a brief warning for me to not look. I wasn't planning on peeking anyway, but I still shaded my eyes to provide him with somewhat of a privacy, and turned away to admire the tile walls of the bathhouse. By the time I dared to peer back, there was now a fresh, clean white towel draped across his waist, and a burning gaze of will power blazing in his fiery red eyes. 

He joined Mondo inside the sauna, letting the wooden door slam shut behind him. Immediately after, I jogged across the length of the room to stand in front of the sauna's now locked door. I wasn't quite sure what my role as the witness was, but I figured it must've had something to do with watching them sit on the crackling wooden bench and claw at each other's throats with their retorts. 

Unfortunately, the door's window was no good, and it was instantly fogged up by a cloud of fresh steam. I could barely make out a thing inside the sauna room; the only things I could see were the deformed lump of Mondo's large black biker jacket, and the wooden walls of the sauna. It was barely enough to aid me in my role as the witness, and even when I pressed my face up against the searing glass, I still couldn't see anything through the haze.

Sighing, I peeled my cheek off of the window and stared at the door in an empty defeat. I couldn't believe what kind of a situation I got myself into. It just all seemed like a domino effect, the events of today toppling over each other like bricks: I visited the library in the morning and ran into Chihiro, who conversed with me briefly before Byakuya kicked us out. After our quick conversation about computer science, I wandered around the second floor without anything else to do, until I found Aoi in the pool area. Once I met up with Aoi, we began to roam the school building together, where Monokuma had stumbled into us. Because of our frightening encounter with the bear, I refused to leave my room just in case I ran into an angry Monokuma once again. And as a result of holing myself up in my dorm for hours upon a time, I got extremely hungry and went to the cafeteria for a snack. And because I decided to pay the dining hall a little visit, I butted right into a heated debate between Mondo and Kiyotaka.

And now, I was here, growing hungrier and more fatigued with each passing second, watching as the two fought it out in an endurance contest inside the sauna.

As the minutes flew by, I tried to occupy myself in the time being. I tried multiple times to peer into the sauna room, but no avail. I leaned against the wall for a few moments, pressing my back against the barrier between me and the two men inside. This, however, only made my back more sweaty, and I felt the fabric of my shirt begin to soak up the sweat and dampen on cue. I removed my body from the steaming wall with a deflated groan, wiping off the droplets of sweat that had formed on my forehead. I cleaned the moist, sticky liquid off of the back of my hand by rubbing it against my skirt, shaking my head from the misfortune. 

I flipped my ponytail with the other hand, allowing the hair to peel off of my sweaty nape and fan my warm skin. Flapping my hand in front of my face in a futile attempt to cool myself, I tried to wipe off the steam from the door's window and peeked inside once more. I could barely make out the hunched, blistering figures of Kiyotaka and Mondo, each a smudge of tan and black, sitting side by side in the sauna. I pressed my ear against the door, trying my best to at least _hear_ something, rather than seeing with my poor eyes.

Through the thick wooden door, I could hear bits and pieces of their deranged conversation, which consisted mostly of yelling and insults.

"H-Hey, Mondo..." Kiyotaka's voice, strained from exhaustion and breathy from dehydration, was a muffled mumble from beyond the door.

"What, asshole?" came Mondo's reply, just as tense and weighty as Kiyotaka's. From the way they were both struggling to speak, I could tell that this whole "sauna battle" had quite the effect on them.

"You can take off your uniform, you know," Kiyotaka remarked, his sentences slower and raspier than usual due to the intense heat beating down on him. "Go ahead, I won't judge."

"And you can go shut the fuck up and mind your own business." Mondo growled, but his tone was far too fatigued to be menacing anymore. "I mean, look at you. Your face is all red." From beyond the door and through the hazy window, I could see him halfheartedly gesture to Kiyotaka's face to prove his point. "What are you, one of those goddamn hot spring monkeys?"

"I-It just so happens...I was b-born with a red face!" Kiyotaka argued behind gritted teeth.

"You don't have to...act all big, man." I could not see his face clearly, but I was almost certain Mondo was tiring out from this competition too, just from the sound of his voice.

"A-Act, you say?" I heard Kiyotaka laugh from behind the door, but it quivered and trembled with exhaustion. "I'm still plenty good to go! I'm so good, I could eat a steaming-hot bowl of soup right now!"

Mondo snorted at his bold remark. "For someone who's, "plenty good to go", you don't...look too good. You can't even hardly talk, dumbass."

"Say wh-whatever you want!" Kiyotaka's energy was indeed starting to drain, as he forced pants between his words and stumbled over phrases. "I'm still totally...good to go! In fact, I'm starting to feel...kinda cold!"

"That's...prolly not good..." Mondo's voice died off before I could catch the rest of it.

I had to agree with him. Surely, spending this much time inside a place so hot couldn't possibly be good for your health, right? I suddenly remembered reading somewhere that staying inside a sauna for too long could lead to dizziness, and even extreme dehydration. Now fueled with utmost worry, I rapped my knuckles against the steamy window to grab their attention.

"Hey, uh...guys?" I raised my voice to a volume above the noisy, consistent hiss of the heater. "I know you both wanna prove how big of a "badass" you are," I made finger quotes even though I knew they couldn't see me very well either, "but don't you think you've done enough already? You can get out now if you want-"

"Not yet!" They both cut me off by yelling in an unexpected unison, and I threw my hands up in surrender.

"Jeez..." I muttered beneath my breath, shaking my head at their solid stubbornness. It probably wouldn't take long for one of them to pass out from the heat. Try as I might, but I couldn't convince either of them to step out even once. I sighed deeply in defeat, drooping my shoulders.

As if on cue, a four note melody began to chime throughout the entirety of the room, echoing faintly beyond the clutter of the pressure heater. My head jerked up from where it originally hung, and I scanned the bathhouse in a haste to find the source of the sound. Sure enough, I spotted yet another one of those bright, neon yellow monitors, one that I had missed before while I was reasoning with the two boys. The blank screen faltered and glitched a few times, flashing the Hope's Peak logo for the slightest second, before displaying Monokuma's face again.

Per usual, he was holding his usual glass of elegant ruby wine, twirling it around in his paw and letting the liquid slosh against the sides. He supported his head by propping up his cheek with the other paw, clearing his throat two times. "Mm, ahem, this is a school announcement. It is now 10 p.m. As such, it is officially nighttime. Soon, the doors to the dining hall will be locked, and entry at that point is strictly prohibited."

As Monokuma finished up his usual nighttime announcement with a few chilling "good night"s, I exhaled my frustration via lungs. It was already 10 p.m, meaning that Kiyotaka and Mondo had been battling it out for almost over an hour. Not only that, it also meant that the dining hall was now locked, and I was forbidden to enter and fetch my long awaited snack. Groaning out of pure vexation, I realized that I would have to wait until tomorrow morning to eat again. 

I ran my fingers through my stringy hair, damp from all the moisture and steam and sweat, and tapped against the door's surface again. "Hey, did you hear that?" I called as a warning. "It's nighttime. How about we call it a tie?"

"In a true competition..." I heard Kiyotaka force out breathlessly from inside the balmy sauna. "There's no such thing as a tie! You win, or you lose. That's...the only thing that matters!"

"Then bring it on!" Mondo seethed, his voice flaring up like a vigorous flame. "I'll...I'll push you right up to the gates of hell!"

"Um..." I stood on my toes, as if that was going to help me see better through the foggy window. I was getting more and more concerned by the minute, for their physical or mental health, I wasn't quite sure which one. "Are you sure?"

I saw a blur of beige wave me off, and I concluded it was Mondo's hand dismissing me as their witness. "You go on back to your room, Junko." His commands were loud enough to even cut through the thick door. "I'll let you know how it went...in the morning! Then you can hear about my...my legendary victory!"

Kiyotaka laughed once again, his voice noticeably more tired this time. "Come tomorrow morning...you'll fall down in front of me...down on your knees. I'll show you where to do it!"

"Big talk from someone...whose face is about to explode!"

"R-Right back at ya!"

I was stunned speechless at how determined they were to win this thing. It stunned me to the point where I felt anxious for their wellbeing. I sincerely hoped nothing bad would happen to the two of them; whether it was death by overheating, or a bloody brawl between the two, I wished that they'd just give it up and leave for their own sake.

But of course, they didn't budge even a single inch from their seats. A silent debate occurred inside my head on whether or not I should stay here and look after them, but my growing hunger and fatigue was getting the better of me. Finally giving in to my lethargy, I let out a sigh so audible, I was sure they could hear it from inside the sauna. 

"Okay, well, good night then." I knocked once against the wooden door as a parting act. "Be careful, okay?"

"Yeah, yeah!" 

I took that as a sign of reassurance, and ultimately got the courage to step away from the sauna door. When I began to walk out of the bathhouse one last time, I glanced behind my shoulder to gaze at the sauna worryingly. I wasn't completely sold on the idea that they would be alright, despite their claims of being so. Were they really going to fight it out to the gates of hell? To the borders of death?

Shaking my head vigorously, I shoved away that nagging, horrifying thought into the darkest corners of my brain. Surely, they wouldn't take it that far, right? 

I tried my hardest to convince myself of that the entire time it took for me to drag my lead filled body to the dorms. The one to two minute long journey was pure torture as I had to endure the pile of sickening, troublesome, "what ifs", that scattered throughout my half conscious mind. As much as I hated it, I could not prevent myself from conjuring up the worst case scenarios.

Even when I unwillingly succumbed to sleep that night, I still could not shake off the sunless presence of death, lingering just around the corner.

*

Kiyotaka and Mondo remained on my mind when I awoke the next morning.

They were the reason why I so reluctantly hauled myself together during my sleepy haze between consciousness and dream. As I slowly drifted awake, my memories of the previous day began to flood right back into my brain, fueling me with pure dread and concern for the two of them. They were the reason why I hurried more than usual to dress myself, not stopping even once to check up on my usual hair, and they were the reason why I burst out of my dorm room, jogging as fast as I could without making too much of a ruckus, all the way to the dining hall.

Still, despite my futile attempts to remain quiet, my heaving footsteps still echoed with clear trepidation. I couldn't prevent my still vague mind from drifting from one horrifying possibility to the next. Were they alright after spending that much time in the sauna? What if their anger got out of control, and somebody got hurt? Or worse, even killed?

My leaden body was weighed down with the paranoia that invaded my bones, and trying to make my way to the dining hall seemed like a challenge more than ever. Once the true worry began to settle in, I felt my pace grow weaker and weaker with anticipation.

When I finally reached the dining hall doors in a painfully slow haste, I hesitated to open the door. My bottom lip got snagged between my teeth as I prepped myself for the worst: a body discovery announcement, a missing person, deformed Kiyotakas and Mondos. Tensing my shoulders stiff, I ultimately gripped the handles until my knuckles turned ivory, and slowly pulled the doors open.

I was expecting something outrageous to spring up on me the moment I entered, but what I saw in reality was truly unforeseen. 

Mondo and Kiyotaka, standing mere centimeters apart, arms around one another and wide smiles stretched upon their faces.

"Hahahaha!" Mondo's distinctive, bellowing laugh echoed throughout the entire hall, halting me dead in my tracks. "What are you talkin' about, bro?"

Kiyotaka gleefully reciprocated his laughter, slinging his arm around Mondo's neck in the most casual way I've ever seen him. "Kahahaha! What are _you_ talkin' about, bro?"

I blinked once, then twice, before my eyes flew wide open in utter shock. With my hand still placed on the door's handle, I stood frozen, staring and blinking at their odd commotion. Confused statements and unintelligent questions slipped from my mouth without my knowing, "What...the...?"

Those two puzzled words were alone to snatch their attention and narrow it down on to me. Mondo turned his head to where I was standing, and raised a friendly arm to acknowledge my presence. "Hey, Junko!" He called out my name, his voice loud enough for everybody in this room. I merely remained still, my eyes darting frantically between him and Kiyotaka, trying to figure out what the hell happened inside that sauna. 

"Thank you so much for acting as our witness yesterday!" Kiyotaka finished his sentence with ease, as if they suddenly grew an inseparable link of telepathy overnight.

It seemed as if my head and my body were disconnected at this moment, for I heard every statement crisp and clear, but my mind was not processing any of it. It couldn't have been many hours ago when they were at each other's throats, flames blazing in their eyes and poison dripping from their insults. And now, they were suddenly the best of friends?

I didn't understand a single fraction of the situation, so I managed a nod of gratitude towards the two, and wordlessly found my way to my seat. Sliding into my usual chair, which was now isolated due to the two missing people on my sides, I turned to Aoi for more information on this whole, "bro" thing. 

"W-What's this all about?" I pointed a finger towards the two men, who were currently laughing off something that had been previously discussed.

Aoi sighed as if I had just asked her about her failing report card, and set her teacup down onto the table with a soft _clink_. "They've been like this all morning," she shook her head deeply, shrugging. "They were all buddy-buddy as soon as they walked in. It feels gross."

"Feels gross?" repeated Mondo, seemingly to catch onto her complaints. He had a look of appall on his face when he snapped, "Hell no. Feels _great,_ more like!"

From beside him, Kiyotaka simply chuckled. "Forget her, bro. A girl like her just doesn't get our manly bond!" 

I raised a questioning eyebrow at that statement. "Girls can't...what?"

"Friendship between men is stronger than blood!" Kiyotaka continued to preach. "A woman could never understand!"

"What you just said?" Mondo grinned, giving him a friendly slap on the back. "Bro, that was cool as shit! I should get a tattoo of it!"

Kiyotaka shook his head, but there was an undeniable smile on his face as well. "No, bro, you mustn't! Your body is a temple, given to you by your loving parents!"

As the two broke into a conjoined, guffawing laughter for the nth time this morning, I broke in, "So, um, who won the contest?"

"Who cares about that?" Mondo barked with an abrupt ferocity at my words, and I flinched instinctively. 

"Yeah!" concurred Kiyotaka, pointing a finger of accusation towards me, this time. "Don't ask stupid questions! What matters is that we both took part in it together!"

I found myself shaking my head, buried deep in confusion. "That's...completely different from what you were saying last night."

"Friendship between men seems very...simplistic." Sakura admitted from her end of the dining table. "Nothing like what I'm used to with girls."

Aoi sighed in agreement. "Yeah, for real..."

I was about to pitch in to their discussion before I was so suddenly interrupted by the sound of ceramic shattering.

Instantaneously, I jumped within my seat from such a loud noise, and whipped my head around to scour for the origin of the sound. What I found was Celeste, sitting elegantly and poised in her usual seat, with the shattered remains of a teacup at her feet. The jagged, sharp pieces of ceramic laid scattered on the ground, with rich dark tea staining the surface and spilling out onto the floor. 

I felt my eyes widen at the obscure scene, my lips parting without any traces of words lingering on them. For some reason, my heart rate sped up as I merely stared at the incident that unfolded in front of me.

Hifumi, who had been standing beside Celeste with a metal tray clutched in his hands, stammered, "H-Hey! What are you doing, my little white rabbit?"

Celeste simply sighed, brushing her fingers against the hem of her dress in an effort to wipe them off. "You brought me the kind of tea I hate the most."

"U-Umm..." It was obvious that Hifumi was intimidated by her prowess, as his figure and words both trembled as he spoke, "I don't understand..."

"Imagine we are at a coffee shop," Celeste continued, thoroughly unbothered. She placed a finger to her chin in thought. "Just any normal, everyday cafe. I sit down, and I order some tea. Milk tea, in fact."

"T-That's what I brought you..." Hifumi's voice trailed off and died in his throat as Celeste glared a silent command to stay quiet.

"In this case," resumed Celeste, her tone firmer now. "Along with my tea, they may bring me a small container of milk, yes? But this style is not for me. I do not drink nor acknowledge any "milk tea" that does not add the milk during the brewing process!"

Hifumi gaped at her in a wide eyed bewilderment. "I went to all that trouble to make you that tea, and you wanted me to go even farther?"

Celeste sighed, resting one hand on top of the other in her lap. "Yes, I realize it can be a bit of a hassle. But it is a must."

"Don't be so-" Hifumi tried to rebut.

"Just bring me my damn tea already, you fucking swine!" Her heavy German accent was lost as she snapped in a voice not quite human.

At this, Hifumi clearly panicked from her sudden anger. "O-Okay! Your little piggy will bring it right out!"

As he scurried and stumbled back to the kitchen, Celeste wore a dainty smile on her face. "I appreciate it." She said, her demeanor fluctuating back to normal as she straightened her back and crossed one leg over the other. 

The entire room echoed of gaping, still silence; even Kiyotaka and Mondo, who had previously been so jolly and casual, were now struck wordless as everybody stared at her. I, gawking in sheer shock at her oddly calm manner, figured that it would be best not to upset her and get on Celeste's bad side. What I just saw was so completely out of character, so usual, that I did not have a single comment to voice. Instead, I slowly turned away without a single sound, and left her be. 

Needless to say, breakfast that morning remained in that same, uncomfortable silence. Nobody had the nerve to disrupt the quietness that was set up by Celestia Ludenberg herself, and our morning meeting concluded with a lingering unease. Even long after I finished eating, I still could not shake off the taboo speechlessness that settled into my bones. 

Sighing, I reached for the silver handles of the twin doors and slipped out of the dining hall on my own. I let the doors swing to a close behind me as I stepped into the eerie hallways of Hope's Peak Academy.

Now that another day has come, I was forced to consider what I should do for the time being. Yesterday's attempts were a fail, as I was chased out of the library by Byakuya, and later the same by Monokuma. It seemed as if there was nothing to do in this place other than talking to the other students. 

Dreading returning to my dorm with nothing to accompany me other than boredom, I began to wander down the halls of the first floor. I shoved my hands deep in the pockets of my cardigan, and the fingers on my right palm brushed against the cool surface of my e-handbook. I fiddled with the electronic gadget, turning it around several times in my hand, and roamed further down the corridor with my eyes trained on my boots. 

I decided that walking aimlessly about the school building was at least a little better than rotting away in my room, because I got in some amount of exercise. With my head hung and drooped against my chest, I peered into the glossy reflection of the tile floors. The pattern consisted of a black and white checkered design, like a giant chessboard spread out on the ground of the school. My watery, distorted image flickered from ink to ivory as I walked further down the hall, hands buried in my jacket.

"H-Hey!" 

A hushed voice drew me from my ocean of thoughts, and I flinched from the sudden intrusion. Snapping my head up, I gazed into the narrowed, pale grey eyes of Toko Fukawa.

"T-Toko?" Startled by her sudden appearance, I voiced my questions out loud. I slowly removed my hands from the cozy warmth of my jacket pockets. "What are you doing here?"

"Why are you s-so surprised?" She hissed under her breath, shooting an accusing glare right at me. "Were you s-shocked at how u-ugly I am?"

"N-No, no!" I immediately defended, waving my hand to dismiss her allegation. "I just wondered what was going on."

At my suggestion of an inquiry, she averted her gaze on to the floor, seemingly nervous. She bit her lip before she spoke, "I have a f-f-favor to ask." 

"Huh?" The sudden request caused a dumbstruck sound to escape from my lips. "What is it?"

She swallowed the lump in her throat preventing her from speaking properly. "I want you to g-go somewhere with me..."

"Where?" I asked, tilting my head slightly to the side as I anticipated her answer.

"W-Well," she inhaled, as if bracing for a blow. "The library."

"The library?" I repeated once again, puzzled by her asking. I did not understand why she would pick me out of all others to accompany her to the library. "Are you looking for a book or something? You should ask Byakuya for that. He spends all of his time in the library, anyway."

A strangled noise escaped from her throat as she stared at me with wide, bewildering eyes. I could tell that she was shocked, and frankly, a bit terrified by me. Afraid that I had said something offensive, I backed up and quickly added in suit, "D-Did I say something wrong?"

She returned to her senses and instantly scowled at my statement, gritting her teeth. "You're not a b-blabbermouth, right?" She jeered in a sudden, aggressive tone. "This h-has to be a secret!"

At this point, I was so confused, I had nothing left inside me to argue anymore. Her abrupt, demanding behavior, her odd request, her random appearance in the hall, all perplexed me to an extent beyond my capacity. I blinked a few times, trying to comprehend her words, before saying, "I have no idea what you're talking about, but if you want me to be quiet, I'll be quiet."

"T-Then, let's go!" She commanded with vigor, making me wince. "Hurry up, let's go to the l-library!"

"Okay, okay!" I acknowledged, wondering why she was being so pushy all of a sudden. As soon as she heard some sort of an agreement, she fled from where she was standing, leaving me to frantically chase after her in the halls. I never knew just how fast the Ultimate Writing Prodigy could run, and I never knew just how unfit I was for sprinting.

I did not have a single clue as to why she was such in a haste, but I didn't have the time to question it. We climbed the long length of stairs up to the second floor of the building, our footsteps loud and panicked. She shoved past the blue tinted hallway, and I, losing my vitality fast, trailed after her in pursuit. By the time we were standing in front of the double oak doors of the library, I was not in that good of a shape.

"Qu-Quiet!" She shushed me between clenched teeth as I tried to catch my breath. I held my hands up in defeat, shaking my head at her hostile commands. "Be quiet when you g-go in! And don't l-let him see you!"

"Jeez, okay!" I had to admit that she was getting on my nerves a bit. I swallowed any remnants of panting down my scratchy throat, and grasped the door handle with my hand. My heartbeat quickened as I braced for the worst to happen. Perhaps a classic sling of insults, or maybe a snide remark about my appearance. Whatever the matter, I gripped the handle tighter than before as a result.

Just as I had been told, I pulled the door open so painfully slow, the hinges were starting to creak. When the gap grew wide enough, I leaned my body to the side so I could peek into the dimly lit room. 

Sure enough, there was Byakuya, seating in his usual spot, his face illuminated by the soft glow of the desk lamp beside him. A new novel was settled in his hand, so I made the assumption that he finished the previous one. Behind his rectangular framed glasses, his icy blue eyes narrowed on to the pages of the book, scanning the words and diving deeper into the enriched story. He looked so invested, so focused, that I regretted ever agreeing to Toko's idea in the first place. I did not want to disturb him at this hour, and I certainly did not want to be called "cover girl" once again.

From behind me, I could feel Toko stand on her toes to peer over my shoulder and gaze inside the library. It seemed as if this was exactly what she wanted, for she whispered an incoherent collection of commands to enter the room, and exhales of pleasurable relief all at the same time. She nudged me to go inside, and, against my will, I obliged.

I crouched low enough to hide my cover, and leisurely crept inside the library. All the while, my eyes were trained on Byakuya, still indulged in his book, as I kneeled behind a bookshelf a few feet away from the table he sat at. I did not understand why Toko demanded I hide from him when I entered, but I had little reason to disagree right now.

Not long after, she quickly joined me in huddling behind the bookshelf. Wrapping her fingers around the edges of the shelf, she peered over the ledge in attempts to gaze at Byakuya. I shuffled closer to the side, crouching right behind Toko, and craned my neck as much as I could without too much pain. 

"H-He's here..." Toko giggled with pure delight, her shoulders shaking up and down as she sighed in bliss. "He's r-really here!"

Suddenly, she turned back to face me with an unreadable look of thrill on her shadowy face. The poor lighting inside the library made it hard to see her features clearly, but by the sound of her excited voice, I knew she had to be smiling. "Okay, J-Junko. Go talk to him!"

"What?" I shot back, surprised by the sudden demand. My voice was a hushed whisper, full of bewilderment and offense. This was her plan, so I hadn't the slightest idea on why _I_ had to carry it out. "Why me?" 

"Stop b-being so loud!" She hissed, glaring at me through pointed eyes. "Just hurry up and g-go talk to him!"

" _You_ go talk to him if you want to so bad!" I retaliated, muttering underneath my breath. The last thing I wanted was to be the one disrupting his tranquility.

"I c-can't!" She refused, reverting her eyes back onto Byakuya. "I don't want to i-interrupt him!"

"And _I_ have to?" I didn't understand her logic at any means. Toko, however, didn't wait for me to pick up another argument, and shoved me closer to the edge of the bookshelf. We had a brief quarrel that was made up of whisper-shouting and silent accusations, before I finally gave up and shook my head, grumbling an admit to defeat. 

Slowly, I stood up from where I was kneeling, and stepped from behind the shelf. I shuffled a bit to the side, shifting my weight awkwardly as I tried to rack my brain for something to say. Byakuya showed no signs of acknowledgement towards me, and remained focused on his book. I cleared my throat once in attempts to grab his attention, and it seemed to do just the trick.

Byakuya's eyes shifted from the pages of his novel and narrowed down onto me in a menacing glare. "Hey, you. Why are you standing there?"

"Oh, um..." I replied unintelligently, my voice hoarse from having to whisper for so long. Byakuya scoffed at my poor endeavors to speak, and returned to reading the book in his hands.

"Get out." He spat, not even looking up to dismiss my presence. "And take her with you."

By "her", I assumed he meant Toko. I glanced behind the bookshelf once again, wondering how he possibly knew she was hiding behind there, and Toko climbed out from her spot. She bit her lip out of pure anxiety, and shyly peered up at the man seating in front of her.

"Hey, um, Byakuya?" She began, her voice full of giddiness and nerve. She played and fiddled with her fingers as she continued on to speak, "Remember how you said, "Don't be a woman who dominates w-weak men. Be a woman dominated by a s-strong man?'"

That was quite the saying, I must admit. I couldn't see Byakuya saying that phrase in his entire life, or even something resembling that sentence. I was soon proven correct.

Byakuya scoffed at her words, flipping a page in his book mindlessly as he retorted, "I never said that."

Toko couldn't seem to take that as a no. "W-Well, actually," she stammered, a grin of perversion stretched across her face as blush dusted on her cheeks. It was like something straight out of a comic book: a girl so madly in love with a man who held no interest for her. "I just thought it sounded like s-something you _might_ say..."

"Get out." Byakuya repeated, almost repulsed by her odd statements. I couldn't exactly blame him for doing so; even I felt as if it was a bit strange for her to go that far as to imagining things. "And go take a bath. You smell."

Now, I thought with a wince, that was a bit harsh. Toko's eyes flew wide open, and her jaw dropped with total shock at the insult. A startled noise roused up inside her throat as she tried to say something in response, but ultimately failed in doing so. I recalled that back in the first Class Trial, Toko had mentioned that she had not showered ever since our first day of imprisonment. It had now been almost a week since then, and I wondered if she still made no attempts to bathe herself.

"Don't make me say it again." warned Byakuya, becoming more and more irritated by our existence as the seconds ticked by. "Go now, before your stench latches onto the entire room."

Looking the most depressed I've ever seen her, Toko's head drooped in shame. "O-Okay..." She whispered, completely and utterly defeated. Her rejection was so painful, I felt some of the ache dig into my own chest. With a stake through her heart, Toko reluctantly dragged herself out of the library, her footsteps slow and agonizing. 

"You too," Byakuya added, shooting a single glare into my wavering eyes. If looks could kill, a body discovery announcement for me would be playing over the speakers already. "Get out, Barbie."

"Barbie?" I echoed, debating whether or not I should feel insulted by that remark. Shaking my head, I decided it was better to not get into another fight with Byakuya, and that I should check up on how Toko was taking in his reaction. "Whatever. Bye, I guess."

He did not reciprocate my farewells, not even after I shouldered out of the room and slipped into the magenta stained hallway. Reinforcing the door shut behind me, I turned to see Toko, standing quite distraughtly, in the middle of the corridor, clutching her head in her hands as she rambled silently about what had just happened. 

"Hey, um," I tried, but I couldn't seem to find the right words to comfort her. She looked so dispirited, and I wanted to offer at least a little bit of help. "Maybe he's just... in a bad mood? Don't get too upset over it."

She let out a shaky exhale, emptying her quivering lungs. "Byakuya...to go that far..." she stumbled over her words as her chest heaved with growing pants.

All of a sudden, Toko clasped her two hands together. "He...he must be r-really concerned about me!"

Seeing her flushed, pink face adorned with a pensive expression drawn over her glassy eyes, I was, without a doubt, stunned. Her attitude was worlds different from just a few seconds ago, as she sighed dreamily at the thought, relishing her warped imagination. I could not stop the startled sound from slipping out of my lips as I stared blankly at her.

"Huh?" My voice trailed off as I tried to understand what part of his words ever showed caring. 

"He told me t-to take a bath and everything." Toko breathed out, astonished by her own fantasy. "He must really care a-about my well-being!"

"Um," I tried to break the reality to her, but something about her lovestruck eyes told me that she wouldn't listen at all. Byakuya could tell her to jump off a building with her clothes on fire, and she'd still say it was a romantic deed. "Well, that's certainly one way you could look at it."

Toko leaned in closer to me, close enough that I could feel her rabid breathing vibrate in the air. "Hey, J-Junko," she prompted, calling my name the same way you'd do to a small dog. "What do you think?"

I felt my eyebrows raise in puzzlement, and I blinked at her odd question. "Think...about what?" I repeated, not thoroughly understanding her words.

"About m-me and Byakuya," she said, her blush darkening beneath the soft pink glow of the hallway lights. "Do you think w-we'd be good together?" 

"Um, well," I inched a bit further from her, starting to feel strangely intimidated and cornered. "Now, I-I don't really know."

Toko finally backed away, straightening her back with an intense look of though stretched across her face. "That's t-true," she concurred, much to my surprise. "There's really no w-way to know. But," she swallowed in the middle of her sentence, and I braced myself for another inane outburst of maddening love. "That's what l-love's all about!"

"Y-Yeah, totally." I reached up a hand to scratch the back of my nape, ruffling my hair a bit out of discomfort. I honestly had no idea what she was rambling about, but I let her do what she wanted to do without much objection. 

"O-One day, you'll u-understand," Toko continued, her voice a pitch higher than usual. "Maybe. S-Someday."

I doubted I would ever fall for a person who was as coldhearted and insolent as Byakuya, nor would I ever create a distorted fantasy about it, but I shrugged in response anyway. I couldn't talk Toko out of her prattles, so I left her be in her own world of make-believe.

"Well," she continued, a perverted grin still tugging at her lips. "I-I should t-take a shower for Byakuya, then. E-Even though I d-don't like them. Goodbye, Junko."

At least she had the courtesy to say farewell to me, unlike Byakuya so rudely refused to earlier. I watched as she stumbled away to the stairwells on the second floor, brushing past the blue lit hallway as she skipped with more spirit than normal. When she finally disappeared from my line of vision, I shook my head. There were some people I just didn't understand, or rather, I couldn't.

It was like trying to become a whole other species. I could try and try and try some more, but at the end of the day, we still had diversely wired minds. We can't control how our thoughts are processed through our brains, which is the sole reason as to why we all deal with trauma differently, and react to praise individually. There were some things other people did that confused me, like picturing a depraved fantasy of a crush, and there were some things I did that confused others, such as combing my hair one hundred times every morning. 

As I was swimming in my pool of deep thoughts, a chilling, sickening voice chirped from beside me.

"Ah, young love!" sighed Monokuma, rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet.

If I said I didn't scream, I'd be lying. I flinched instinctively at his appearance, leaping back at least three feet as I gawked wide eyed at the robotic bear. I still recalled our moments yesterday, inside the musty, aging classroom, where I had somehow upset him. Surprised, I stood open mouthed and staring at Monokuma as he went on to ramble about love, just as how Toko did. 

"Who would've ever guessed she would go for someone like him?" Monokuma said lively, like he was gossiping about his closest friend's crush behind their back. "But eager passion can also be scary! Sometimes, that leads people off in the wrong direction!"

"Wh-What does that mean?" I tried to make my voice demanding, but it came out rather weak instead. I did not like the suggestive tone of his voice; he sounded as if he knew something I didn't, something quite atrocious, in fact. 

Instead of answering my wavering question, Monokuma let out a frightening howl of laughter. It was almost like he was holding a dreadful secret from me. "You'll find out soon enough, Junko!" He called before waddling away in the other direction, disappearing faster than he had came. 

I still did not understand the reason as to why Monokuma appeared and left as he pleased, seemingly popping out of nowhere. Where he came from, how he snuck up on me, and why did he chose to do so, all were left unknown to me. Perhaps he just enjoyed scaring us for the fun of it. At that thought, I sighed for the nth time that morning.

I was unbelievably worn by my previous activities, even though all I did was fallibly sneak into the library, and had an uncomfortable discussion about love with Toko. I figured I should just head back to my dorm to rest for a while. 

With that plan in mind, I began to depart the pink tinted corridor. The only sounds echoing through the entirety of the second floor were my hollow footsteps and soft breathing. I maneuvered to the left, out of the magenta hall, and into the aqua blue aisle. Clutching my elbows in my hands, I brushed past the countless number of closed door classrooms, slipped by the pool foyer, and down into the stairs.

As I descended from the second floor, thoughts of Monokuma's haunting words flooded into my mind. What did he mean by "you'll find out soon enough"? I had no idea what he was talking about, but I assumed he meant Toko and Byakuya's relationship. It was obvious that the girl was obsessed with him, but I doubted she'd go any further. At least, I hoped she would stay in her lane. I did not want her thirst and passion to twist her into a whole other being, capable of harming others for love. 

I tried to shove away those negative thoughts from my consciousness, jamming them into the darkest corners of my brain. I was being too pessimistic; only a day or two has passed since the last trial. Hopefully, we would be given some time to recover before another murder occurred.

My feet carried me all the way back to the dormitory, now getting a sense of the layout of the school building. Horrifyingly enough, I was getting used to living here, trapped inside the academy. I could navigate to certain areas without using the overhead signs, I grew accustomed to the daily morning and night announcements, and I no longer looked for an escape route on the first floor. 

Flipping a thick ponytail over my shoulder, I exhaled deeply, letting go of all of my useless ponders. I trudged through the red hallway of the dorms, scanning the pixelated name plates for my own. It didn't take long for me to locate it, and I shouldered my way to the dorm room. 

As soon as I set my hand on top of the silver handle, I heard a door click open softly from behind me. I turned to see Chihiro, carrying the same, dusty laptop from the library, jammed underneath her arm. Remembering our conversation from yesterday, I decided to call out to her.

"Hey, Chihiro!" I greeted from my side of the hall, and she flinched slightly from the volume of my voice. She gazed up to meet my eyes with a shy smile on her face.

"Hi, Junko." She waved to me with her free arm, friendly sparkles glittering in her eyes.

I pointed to the computer wedged to her side. "Is that the laptop you're fixing?" I questioned, craning my neck so I could get a glimpse of the gadget. Just as I had expected, I saw a flash of black patterns, which I deciphered to be the Hope's Peak logo. 

She nodded, clutching the laptop close to her chest. "Yeah. I'm gonna work on it a little more before I can show you the program."

I returned her grin effortlessly. "Cool. I can't wait to see it!" 

My encouraging response caused a giggle to escape from her lips, and I felt a rush of pride for securing her happiness. "Okay! I'll talk to you later, then." She left me with another wave, a departing one this time, before briskly walking out of the corridor, computer still held up to her torso. 

I was glad that Chihiro was smiling again. She had been so distraught over her weakness, despite all of our reassurances. She kept on insisting that she had to get stronger, for what reason, I did not know. I felt relieved to see her finally at ease. With that thought comforting my restless mind, I placed my hand back on the handle.

Using my dorm key that I had originally stashed inside my one of my cardigan pockets, I twisted the lock with some exertion, and pushed the door open.

Although I dreamed to escape the worries of reality, I found nightmares of crimson waiting for me.

*

The crackle of the school speakers caught my attention first.

I knew that sound all too well. It signified the beginning of a school announcement, a warning sign before the crash of a storm. I heard the soft sizzle every morning and every night, whenever Monokuma had a declaration to make to the rest of the class. What would follow soon after was the sting of his voice, crackling over the speakers and digging into the flesh of my brain. 

Accompanied by the hiss of the loudspeaker, was the flicker of the monitor screen in my room. The blank surface glitched for a few seconds before displaying Monokuma's cheery face, seated inside some sort of a surveillance room, per usual. I rubbed any remains of exhaustion from my weary eyes and squinted at the monitor, hanging a few feet away from my bed. 

"Ahem!" Monokuma cleared his throat, his voice sounding rather glitchy over the poor quality of the speakers. "School announcement, school announcement."

This caught me off guard. I assumed it was later during the night, so I was preparing myself for yet another nighttime announcement. However, this time, the message was different from before, and I straightened my back in anticipation of what was next to come. 

"Nighttime is quickly approaching," stated Monokuma, wobbling and turning the glass of ruby wine in his paw. Some of the liquid sloshed out of the cup, staining the rim a deep maroon. "But before it arrives, all students, please gather in the gym immediately."

The gym?

Now that was quite the surprise. We hadn't all gathered in the gymnasium ever since Sayaka's death, which was a few days ago. And whenever we did, it was always for a special sort of announcement from Monokuma. I could only imagine what he had in store today. 

I recalled my thoughts from the morning, when Monokuma had a brief, one sided discussion with me. It might've only been my imagination, but I couldn't help but feel as if he was hinting at a plan earlier today. Maybe, this was the plan he had in action, and I dreaded to find out its contents.

"Emergency! Emergency!" Monokuma called out from behind the loudspeaker, his voice an obviously fake panic. Before he could say anything else, however, the screen cut back to black, and his voice disappeared into the thin echoes of the air. I stared blankly at the monitor, still trying to process his announcement.

"Gather in the gym?" I heard myself mutter, attempting to comprehend his commands. I was confused by the sudden message, as it was completely different from what he said routinely each night. One too many questions began to swarm my head, until there was no more room left to think rationally. Lead heavy trepidation settled into my bones, making my heart race faster and faster inside my hollow chest. The worst feeling of sour dread formed inside of my stomach, and I felt quite repulsed by the announcement.

I feared that my assumptions were made true; Monokuma was indeed scheming something for all of us to do. 

I slowly stood up from the edge of my bed, rolling my tight shoulders back in a stretch. Standing in front of the full body length mirror beside my nightstand, I stared into my own empty, ghastly eyes and debated whether or not I should obey Monokuma's commands. 

Whatever he had in mind, it certainly wasn't very family friendly. Another motive, more rules, the list goes on and on forever. But I knew it was better not to defy Monokuma, unless I wanted a death wish. And right now, I definitely did not want to die.

Letting an incoherent curse word slip from my tongue, I combed down my hair with my slender fingers and ultimately decided I would go. 

I cautiously left the safety of my room, locking the door behind me with expertise, and stepped out into the dim hallways of Hope's Peak Academy. I saw that a few other students had emerged from their dorms as well, closing the doors softly and anxiously making their way toward the direction of the gym. 

Wordlessly, we all grouped into a giant, deformed clump of trembling, whispering teenagers, and roamed down the halls together in a pack. My footsteps fell in line with Celeste's, and we walked side by side without a single sound. As we weaved our way past hallway to hallway, I kept my eyes aimed at the ground. 

The entire time we walked towards the gymnasium, my blood was roaring inside my ears. My heartbeat only grew faster and faster as we neared the gym, and my mind was overflowing with worries and gory thoughts. I knew I was probably just being a tad dramatic, but I reminded myself that nothing was set in stone with Monokuma. And most definitely, nothing was ever positive in the killing school life.

Somebody, most likely Sakura, held the gym foyer doors open for the rest of us to enter. I mumbled a quiet "thank you" beneath my breath, too distressed to raise my voice any higher. The dread weighing down inside me was thick, heavy, unable to be freed of. It sat on my shoulders like a boulder, dragging me down to the depths of despair. I tried to shove it off, but with no such luck. 

Prepping for the worst to happen, I ducked into the gymnasium. 

When I stepped inside, I saw that everybody was there, standing scattered around the gym floors. Whispers and murmurs of rumors spread across the room with unease lingering in the air. I swallowed down my own discomfort and did a silent head count of everyone who was present. An exhale of relief left my hefty lungs as I discovered no such deaths. Including myself, I was rewarded with the grand number of twelve. 

"Hmm..." Kiyotaka pondered rhetorically to himself. "Asking us to gather together all of a sudden like this...What could he possibly want?"

"Indeed." agreed Celeste from my far right. "What might await us this time?"

Byakuya, who showed up, much to my surprise, chuckled to nobody in particular. "He keeps things interesting, that's for sure."

"How is that funny?" asked Hifumi, sweating at his sadistic behavior of sorts. "Can't you smile like a normal person for once?"

"There's something totally messed up with you if you can laugh at a time like this!" Aoi accused, her voice raising in volume as she glared at the heir. 

In response, Byakuya scoffed at her demands and crossed his arms over his chest. "Which one of us is _actually_ "messed up", hm?"

Aoi was clearly not expecting that odd answer, as she recoiled and widened her eyes. "Wh-What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing in particular," Byakuya remarked, a resemblance of a smirk pulling at his lips. "Just admiring, that's all."

I opened and closed my mouth, like a fish out of water, puzzled by his words. "Admiring what?" I reluctantly asked, even though I was afraid of his reply.

"I don't want to kill anyone." stated Byakuya simply, staring dead into my eyes. I broke eye contact immediately, and stared off at the stage set up in the front of the gymnasium. I couldn't stand gazing into those menacing eyes without feeling like a cornered prey. "But I also don't want to stay here, living in blind denial day after day. I was just admiring how you could live like that and still keep your sanity."

"I'm not in denial." Aoi tried to counter, clenching her fist, and glaring at him through pointed eyes and gritted teeth. 

"That reminds me," Byakuya said, a full fledged grin now stretched upon his face. "Remember how you kept talking about how the police or whoever would come help us? How'd that turn out? It seems to me there's no sign whatsoever of possible rescue."

"Th-That's just..." Aoi's voice died off, unable to voice out a witty retort. "...I wonder what actually happened."

Kyoko, who's presence I hadn't even known was present, nodded her head. "It's strange, that's true," she concurred, cupping her chin with her fingers. "There's no way the police wouldn't know about it. We're right in the middle of a major urban area."

"The police suck!" Hifumi declared out loud. 

"On the contrary," Celeste pitched in, her tone much less demanding than Hifumi's. "The mastermind may be just that powerful, to take control even of the police."

"Oh!" Something unknown sparked Yasuhiro into sudden action. He raised his head to speak more clearly. "This might not be related, but-"

"Then don't say it." Toko snapped.

"Nope! Gonna say it!" rebutted Yasuhiro, causing Toko to roll her eyes wordlessly. "It's about last night. I was near the main hall, just staring off into space, when all of a sudden, I heard it."

Chihiro held her hands close to her chest, as if she were afraid of what's next. "You heard what?" She questioned, her voice shaky.

"I don't really know what it was," Yasuhiro admitted, shrugging it off as if it were minor. "But if I had to describe it, it was sorta like..." his voice trailed off as he tried to think of an answer, "a construction site, I guess?"

"A construction site?" Confusion was evident in my voice as I echoed his words.

"I mean, I could just be making that up." Yasuhiro added, squinting his eyes in thought. "I only just barely heard anything." 

Toko scoffed, reaching to play with a loose strand of her dark purple hair. "Then you d-definitely made it up. M-Must've just been the sound of the ocean in t-that head of yours."

"What ocean?" defended Yasuhiro.

"B-Because your brain is s-so empty, you must've heard the w-wind blowing inside of it!" She elaborated with a sly smirk on her face.

"Hey! My brain's not-"

"Whatcha talking about?" A sharp, gleeful voice cut in, like a knife slicing through skin. I felt the immediate sting of his voice and winced instinctively, daring to take a peek at the stage up front.

Sure enough, there was Monokuma, seated on top of the podium with the most ominous smile on his face. I still hadn't the slightest clue where he came from, but no matter, he still frightened us to no extent.

"I-It's Monokuma!" I heard Yasuhiro cry out, leaping back at least five feet in order to avoid the bear.

"He's here." stated Kyoko, her collected reaction the exact opposite of Yasuhiro.

Monokuma ignored our yells of alarm and stood up from the podium. He leaned in to stare at us all in the face, to the point where I felt uncomfortable from the way he was leering at me. It was taunting, almost.

"What Hiro heard wasn't the sound of construction," Monokuma remarked, calling him by his nickname. "But it _could_ have been an explosion!"

"What?" My bewildered yelp was accompanied by the demands of others. An explosion was too far out of reality; how could there be an explosion in the middle of a bustling city?

"Or maybe a machine gun!" continued Monokuma, giggling to himself at the mention of such brute weapons. "That can kinda sound like construction in a way!"

"What the hell does that mean?" Mondo shouted, folding his fingers into a fist of anger. My mind was spinning much too fast for me to even say anything. Was he joking or not?

"Ah-ah-ah!" Monokuma jeered, beginning to prance and skip around the small surface of the podium. "Beyond this point, my mouth is zipped, my lips are seal, I am fully puckered!"

"Fine," Kyoko remained stoic and composed as she stared down Monokuma with a gaze of steel. "Then let's move on to what you _can_ tell us. Why did you call us here?"

"You don't beat around the ol' bush, do ya?" Monokuma tilted his head, almost impressed by her poise. "Ready for me to get to the point, huh?"

"Just say it." said Kyoko, crossing her arms. It seems even her patience was wearing down by his antics.

Monokuma huffed, sulking lower and lower as he said, "You mind if I vent a little? I'm low on energy these days. My stitching's even losing all its shine and luster..."

"The hell?" I heard myself mumble, shaking my head. He was completely avoiding the question.

"I'm thinking, it's probably because of this totally boring, old everyday life," Monokuma continued to ramble, his red eye glowering as a sign of vexation. "I'm looking for something more interesting! Something with a little more stimulation, something rife with danger and intrigue!"

Kyoko sighed in utter disappointment, muttering something beneath her breath that I couldn't quite hear.

"Listen, can I be frank?" said Monokuma, his tiny, hooked silver claws unsheathing from his black paw. "The next blackened hasn't showed up yet, and I'm getting booooored!" He stretched out the word "bored", like how a child would. "So, I've decided to come up with a new way to motivate you!"

"M-Motivate?" I repeated, my eyes widening at the thought. It was just as I had predicted: this announcement was fit for another group of motives to urge us to start killing again. "Is it another set of videos or something? Are you gonna show us some demented thing to try and drive us all to murder?"

"Drive you to murder?" It was now Monokuma's turn to echo what I had just said. He held up his claws close to his face. "What a mean thing to say! Just awful!"

Kiyotaka pointed a finger towards the bear, declaring, "I don't know what you've got planned, but we're not going to kill each other anymore!"

"That's very big talk." Monokuma admitted. "Do your very best to back it up, okay?"

"What is it?" Byakuya deadpanned, glaring down at the robotic animal with eyes of ice.

"Jeez! So impatient!" complained Monokuma, reaching behind his back. I grimaced and tilted away, afraid that he'd whip out a bomb or something. "So, this time it's..."

He held out a stack of manilla colored envelopes, each with a scribble of black marker on the front. "Embarrassing memories and deep, dark secrets!"

"Huh?" Almost everybody in the room collectively questioned at once. I was not expecting something as personal as that to be the next motive. 

"As long as you're alive, it's a given that there's things you don't want other people to know about you!" Monokuma waved the pile of thin sleeves in the air, like some grand prize to be claimed. "So I did a little investigating of my own, and I dug up some of your darkest secrets! Here, catch!"

Without any sign of a warning, Monokuma threw the envelopes into the air.

The little slips of paper fluttered from the sky, like snowflakes, before drifting clumsily to the ground. At once, everybody rushed forward, shoving past one another to frantically snatch up their own secrets. I ducked beneath a few flying elbows and arms to scour for the envelope with my own name scrawled on it.

The moment I spotted mine, I seized the thin scrap in my hands, gripping the paper so tightly, I was afraid I was going to break it. My heart rammed against my ribcage as I anxiously turned the envelope around inside my sweaty palms. My breathing became labored as I heard other people cry out in raw alarm and pure shock at what was written down. 

My hands were shaking as I reached to tear the envelope, dragging my fingers leisurely across the face. The absolute feeling of panic weighing down my body was indescribable to man. 

I pulled out the folded piece of ivory pale paper.

And read the contents.

Slowly.

Word for word.

_Junko starred in an illegal adult movie when she was 16._

My body went rigid.

My worst fear had now come true.

Chest heaving with frenzied breaths, I stared at the little ink letters printed neatly on the page. How in the world did he find out about this? I thought I had done everything in my power to erase that secret from my record. My modeling company, my managers, they all paid thousands just to that cover up. Not even my closest family knew about this. So how did Monokuma find out?

The room was suddenly engulfed in a swarm of fevered screams and yells of alarm as everybody read their own comments. This only informed me that what was written on each person's envelope was indeed true. My head spun until I was dizzy and faint with pure confusion. 

The only thought I had was, "how?"

"You have twenty four hours!" cheered Monokuma above the growing cloud of anguished cries. "If someone doesn't become blackened by then, all your deepest, darkest, most embarrassingest secrets will be exposed to the world!"

"Is this what you mean by, "motivate"?" Kyoko folded her own piece of paper back into the envelope with her name scratched on top. I couldn't even comprehend the fact that she was still so calm in a situation like this. What kind of a secret did she even have?

"Yup, you got it!" Monokuma giggled devilishly into his paws, amused by our reaction. "They're all pretty unpleasant, trust me. None of you want me to reveal that stuff, right?"

I definitely did not want a single person to find out my secret. My status, my identity, everything I owned would be gone in an instant if he revealed this to the world. What would my parents think? My sister? My friends? 

My hands shook as I clutched the paper in my grasp. My vision blurring with utter hatred, I tore the slip into halves. 

Certainly, having this escape to society would destroy everything I've built to achieve so far. How much hate would I get from the world? How much despair would I fall into?

It might as well be signing my own death warrant.

But was keeping it a secret worth sacrificing a human life?

"It's definitely something I'd rather keep in the dark," My voice was scratchy and hoarse as I spoke up. I shoved the two pieces of paper into my pocket, deep enough so that nobody would ever find out. "But," I swallowed, "we'd never kill over something like that!"

It seemed as if my reply shocked Monokuma. His wicked, red eye glowed again with fury as he glared straight at me. "Wh-What'd you say?"

"S-She's right!" Kiyotaka proclaimed, clenching a tight fist around his own letter. "Your plan is doomed to fail! No one's gonna murder someone for this kind of thing!"

Monokuma's face fell, and he gazed sadly at the floor. "O-Oh no..." His voice was small and depressed as he drooped his head in shame. "I thought for sure this was gonna work. I have stuff I wouldn't want anyone to know no matter what, so I assumed you'd all be the same..."

"Yeah, we all have embarrassing stuff we want to keep hidden," I admitted, trying to shake off the tremble of fear in my own tone. "But we're not gonna kill someone for that!"

"Maaan!" Monokuma turned his back on us, obviously demoralized by our refusal to oblige. "You're really saying you won't kill each other over this stuff! That just sucks!" He began to slunk away from the rest of us. "Okay, then in twenty four hours, I'll expose all your secrets just to make myself feel a little better!"

He disappeared into the gym's red podium, still muttering nonsense about how upsetting it was for us to deny it. I could still hear his dejected words echoing in the depths of my ear, even after he had left.

Once again, we were left in a stunned silence.

Aoi was the first to speak after a minute or two of quietude. "I didn't know what to expect at first, but..." she held up her own paper and reread the words on the surface. "maybe we dodged a bullet on this one."

"I mean," Yasuhiro tucked away his envelope somewhere in his black jacket. "Yeah, having those secrets be revealed is gonna be embarrassing. But no one's gonna _kill_ for that, right?"

"Good news, everyone!" announced Kiyotaka as soon as Yasuhiro finished speaking. "I have a brilliant idea! Why don't we all just confess the secrets in those envelopes right here and now? If we do that, any and all motive for murder will vanish! That's pretty smart, right?"

He looked rather pleased with himself for coming up with such a plan, but others clearly disagreed. 

"Th-That's a stupid idea!" Toko growled between clenched teeth. "I-I don't want to t-talk about mine! At all!"

"Neither do I," concurred Celeste, looking the most troublesome I've ever seen. "Not because it is unpleasant, but because it is impossible."

"I agree with them." Byakuya said, folding his piece of paper into a small, compressed square. "There's no need to discuss it."

Distraught that nobody was agreeing, Kiyotaka panicked and glanced around the room for backup. "Hey! What do you think, Chihiro?"

"Um, s-sorry..." she rejected politely, bowing her head down in shame. "I don't really want to talk about it right now. B-But," she swallowed before exhaling deeply, "I also don't want to leave things as they are. So maybe, after I become stronger, I can tell everyone."

Aoi nodded glumly, tucking her slip of paper back into its sleeve. "If you don't wanna talk about it, you don't have to. I'm not super excited to talk about mine, either."

Mondo shook his head in defeat. "If everyone's that much against it...Even if my bro's the one that suggested it, I gotta say no."

"W-Well, that's okay, then." Kiyotaka said. "Either way, if it's just a few secrets, I'm sure nobody's about to kill anybody over it."

I hoped that he was right.

Grumbles and murmurs spread across the air like a plague, filling my head with doubts. I didn't know what kind of secrets the others had, but from the way everybody was collectively agreeing, I assumed they weren't to horrid enough to die for. I rested my hand above my jacket pocket, feeling the weight of the shredded paper inside. It seemed to weigh down my entire body, even though it was just a few grams.

By the time the nighttime announcement chimed over the loudspeakers, everybody was already filing out of the gymnasium. I trailed after my classmates in suit, my fingers still clutching the pieces of paper inside my cardigan. Numbness infected each and every one of my limbs, until I could no longer feel myself walk anymore.

Still, I couldn't shake the undeniable fear that consumed me whole when I locked my door that night. Was everybody really all on board with the plan? I was almost completely certain that nobody would murder over a petty secret, or an embarrassing memory. Not even I. It seemed almost too absurd, too selfish, too inhumane to do so.

A secret so bad, you would kill for it to remain hidden. Surely, no one's private matter was that bad, right?

Then again, I thought, when I laid my head down onto my pillow, 

I was probably just being too optimistic.

*

What was that sound?

I couldn't fully decipher it in detail; all I caught were deranged chunks of noise filtering into my dead heavy ears. The pitch was rather high, almost painfully high. And the volume was certainly not suited for a morning voice.

It almost sounded like a person, although I couldn't be quite certain. There were no translatable words for me to pick up on, just mumbled, mixed sentences and choppy spurts of sound. These short, choked words soon began to sound cleaner, free of static, as my consciousness slowly drifted from the realm of dream. My head, although foggy, was able to decode some of the jumbled noises as parts of words.

What did "ood" mean?

With a newly found irritation at the sound, my eyes peeled open with reluctance, squinting hazily underneath the lights of my dorm room. After a few moments drifting between awake and asleep, I finally translated what was being said. 

"Good morning!" Monokuma sang, right into my face.

My scream was ten pitches higher than my usual voice as I jolted upright from the mattress, awake and alert at last. Abruptly, my heart began to sprint circles inside my ribcage, beating a rhythm so loud, I was sure Monokuma could have heard it. Out of instinct, my hands immediately flew to clutch my chest, afraid that I was going to pass out again from shock. 

At my frightened response, Monokuma giggled madly into his paws with great pride and satisfaction of his own acts, like a young child scaring their older sibling awake. "Nice reaction! I'm glad to see you didn't disappoint!"

"Wh-What are you doing here?" I could barely form coherent sentences from the way my voice trembled immensely from distress, still recovering from my previous, heart-yanking startle. My blood still pounded in my ears, nearly drowning out Monokuma's next haunting words.

"I wanted to spice things up!" He chirped, easing onto the flats of his feet. He began to rock back and forth in front of my bed, resembling an impatient toddler. "So instead of a school announcement, I decided to wake you up in person!"

"What the hell for?" I demanded. I could hear my own frustration and fear creep up in the grisly tone of my voice.

"Because it's fun." stated Monokuma, as if it were the obvious. "And as long as I'm here, I figured I'd let you hear it right from the bear's mouth."

My fatigued eyes, still rusted from sleep blinked a few times as the sentences entered one ear and exited out the other. "Hear what?" 

In answer, Monokuma stood back on his toes, stretching his neck as close to me as possible from his position. The look of psychopathic menace in his beady little eyes only added fuel to my burning fire of horror. "Are you sure you should be acting this laid back? Even when something happened to one of your buddy-buddy classmates?"

I must have looked like a complete idiot, since Monokuma immediately burst into a fit of snickers upon the sight of my pale face. "Are you good, Junko? Your face is all blue, like someone on the verge of death!"

My brain stopped registering spoken vocables. I could no longer hear him speak anymore, because the only sort of sounds echoing around in the hollows of my ears were the petrifying words of, "something happened", and "classmate". They repeated over and over and over again, until I could no longer think on my own without being influenced by raw, inhuman fear. 

If I thought my heart was beating fast before, I was instantly proven wrong. My chest throbbed with an unexplainable ache of terror, and my breaths only grew more and more shallow with each second spent in stillness. I heard my fingers tightly grip the rough canvas of my bedsheets, but I felt nothing but hot, heavy dread flowing in my veins.

"What..." My voice was a mere rasp inside my throat, hoarse from sheer, unfiltered panic. "What happened?" I swallowed with much difficulty, attempting to shove my growing alarm deep down into my stomach. Ultimately, I failed, and everything I tried holding back came billowing out in a desperate, loud shout, "What are you talking about?"

Again, Monokuma sniggered into his monochrome paws, his tiny shoulders shaking up and down with bliss. "Well, you'll have to find that out yourself! Good luck!"

He left before I could even collect my sanity.

I remained frozen in my bed, eyes growing wider with each atrocious possibility that darted inside my mind. Breathing soon became a difficult burden, as I tried to steady my inhales alongside my frayed nerves, but yet again, emerged unsuccessful. My vision blurred red as I unconsciously thought of the worst possible recourses.

"No," I resorted to talking to myself now, my arms and legs shaking underneath the bedcovers from the pure anxiety that ate up my soul. "That-It's not-"

But what if it is?

I didn't even have an idea on what "it" was, but it was enough for me to rip off the sheets and sprint off my bed. All the while as I was frantically dressing myself, I didn't even look into the mirror once; hell, I didn't even make time to do my hair. It was not my proudest moment, but to me, checking on the other students far outweighed my appearance in terms of significance. 

Mindlessly, I threw on my usual clothes, not ever stopping to check for wrinkles, and fled out my dorm in such a haste, I almost tripped over my own boots. I almost forgot to lock my room behind me before I made a run for the dining hall, just a few paces away from the dormitory. 

When I burst into the dining hall, I was enveloped in so much consternation that I stumbled when I entered. I had to catch myself on the bulky, hefty metal doors in order to prevent my body from slipping onto the cold, rigid ground.

"Ah, Junko!" I heard Aoi call out, her tone displaying clear signs of distress and concern. 

"Are you okay?" said Yasuhiro when I jerked my head up with sudden vigor, eyes wide due to solid fear.

I couldn't reply to his question because I didn't know the answer myself.

"Did Monokuma talk to you, too?" asked Sakura, her eyes narrowed and eyebrows furrowed in a cloud of perturbation. 

Straightening my back, still sore from sleep, I could only offer a timid nod of my head in response. Instantaneously, my eyes flitted across the vast interior of the dining hall, doing a silent head count of all who were present. I noted Yasuhiro, Aoi, Sakura, and Byakuya; a total of five people, including myself.

"You're the only ones here?" The surprised remark tumbled from my mouth, rolling on to the floor. "W-Where's everyone else?"

Byakuya, who was standing only a few feet away from me, crossed his arms again out of habit. "Either they're already off trying to verify what Monokuma said," he put simply, sparing a glance towards my direction. "Or they've fallen victim to the "something" that Monokuma mentioned."

"The...something?" I repeated, my voice thick and meek as it clawed its way from my throat.

"It can't be..." Sakura's statement trailed off as she pondered the thought once again. "Has it happened again? Murder?" 

Murder?

Murder, or in other terms, homicide. The unlawful act of one human taking the life of another. The worst crime out of all possible crimes. Was that what really happened, here in the most prestigious school in Japan? Here in Hope's Peak?

That thought planted seeds of true horror inside every inch of my body, and it took everything I had remaining in me to drive them all away.

"S-So if something really did happen," Yasuhiro began to sweat out of anxiety as he forced out his thoughts. "Does that mean someone did it 'cause of what happened yesterday?"

Aoi's eyes broadened as a gasp escaped from her lungs. "It can't be! That stuff was just a bunch of old memories!"

Byakuya pitched in a testy scoff into our conversation. "'Just" old memories? Don't be so sure about that. Clearly, someone felt it was more important that just that."

"Huh?" Aoi said, her lips parting as she tried to say more, but couldn't.

"To judge someone else's values based on your own outlook," Byakuya went on to elaborate his previous words. "Do you realize how dangerous that is?"

"W-What do you mean by "dangerous"?" I was afraid to ask, but I did so anyway.

A smirk plastered on his face, Byakuya retorted with, "Not everybody thinks the same way here. This isn't a co-op game, it's every man for himself. Obviously, someone's going to have an opinion on the "embarrassing memories" that differs from yours."

"And that's why...someone killed someone over it?" Yasuhiro's face turned ashen as the thought finally sank in.

"We need to find out what happened," suggested Sakura, arising from where she originally sat. "We have to confirm it for ourselves."

"She's right." Byakuya concurred, unfolding his arms from his chest as he spoke. "Let's all split up and begin looking." 

With that, he suddenly whipped his shoulder around to face me. The glare he shot right through my wavering gaze was stern, challenging, almost. It was like he was daring me to defeat a game only he could win. 

"Junko," he said my name out loud, causing me to blink wildly out of puzzlement. "Come with me."

"Huh?" Was my only reply, as I stood dumbfounded and caught off guard. 

He sighed shortly, as if he were impatient with my slow reaction. "Don't make me repeat myself. The game has already begun, and it can't wait for us to start. Hurry."

Still wondering why he chose me out of all people, I managed some sort of a nod of understanding. Seeing my response, Byakuya turned to the rest of our small group to give out orders like a commander.

"You three," he pointed to Sakura, Aoi, and Yasuhiro. "Check the first floor. Junko and I will take the second story."

At his word, the aforementioned ones raced out of the dining halls, not all due to Byakuya's instructions, but mainly because their worry had finally sucked up enough of their patience. The doors slammed noisily behind their trail, leaving a loud, haunting echo behind for my ears to swallow. 

Byakuya probably wasn't the most forbearing out of the bunch, because as soon as they had left, he immediately faced me again with new directions to tell. His eyes of ice narrowed as many thoughts began to dwell over his head, thoughts that I could not read just by studying his face. 

"We should get going," his voice made it sound as if he were just talking about himself, rather than the two of us as a team. "I have my suspicions on a particular place."

"What particular place?" I was hesitant in saying my wonders out loud, and it seemed as if Byakuya didn't want to hear them either. He dismissed any lingering inquires I had with a halfhearted wave of his hand.

"You ask too many questions," he stated, almost irritated by my perplexity. "You'll find out when we get there. Come on."

Without waiting for me to muster a rebuttal, or even a reply, Byakuya began to briskly walk for the dining hall's exits, his back now turned to me. I swallowed thickly, trying to hear my soundless, rapid breathing over the intensity of my own heartbeat. Undoubtedly, my whole body was completely flooded with the inky sensation labeled "fear". As much as I wanted to deny it over and over again, I was forced to realize I had to figure the situation out on my own. 

I had never prayed to God before in my entire life, but today was a first.

I didn't even know I was holding my breath in until I almost fainted from oxygen loss on the stairs to the second floor. My head was getting lighter and lighter, dizzier and dizzier, as my breathing grew shallower with each step I took. My arms were trembling to no end, each and every one of my nerves fried from the flame that is trepidation. The weak steps I took while trudging after Byakuya on the second floor wavered with each stride, and I could barely perceive their cacophonous slaps over my own surging panic. 

What in the hell even happened?

I couldn't imagine seeing another corpse after Sayaka's death. The mere mention of cadavers repulsed me to the point where I felt frail enough to fall onto my knees, all of the strength encouraging me to stand up suddenly gone from my limbs. I shivered, even when the air around me grew unexpectedly warm. When the possibility of death crossed my bleary, hysteric mind, I tried everything in my power to steer away from that thought.

Byakuya abruptly halted in front of the pool foyer, resulting in me almost crashing into him out of my panicked haze. I inhaled a deep, shaky breath, watching as he reached to pull the cheery violet doors open.

"These locker rooms are suspicious." He sounded as if he were talking in a tranced monologue as we entered the common room. "Very suspicious, indeed. Wouldn't you agree?"

When he turned to me for my input, I was so tense I couldn't say a word.

"We should start with the girl's locker room first," he continued without any sign of hesitation, nor uneasiness at the uncomfortable silence. I felt my eyes broaden within their sunken sockets as he stepped a foot closer to the magenta tinted door, a hand outstretched to grip the handle.

"W-Wait!" Out of pure alarm, I somehow found my voice again. "Boys can't enter the girls locker room. I-I'll open it with my handbook."

If he heard the tremble in my voice, he didn't show it. Byakuya merely stepped aside for me, an incoherent mumble that sounded somewhat like an agreement escaping his lips. 

I reached inside my pocket with quivering fingers, my chest aching with anticipation. My breaths were even more unsteady, jumbling around inside my raw, dry throat as my heart rammed against my chest like a hammer. Heat flooded my face, clouding my eyes with a veil of compressed terror. My fingertips grazed the edge of my e-handbook, and I froze.

What was behind that door?

What was waiting inside that locker room could be anything. It could be the usual layout of the changing room, clean and sparkling and untouched, enough to make me unwind just the slightest bit. 

It could also be the bloodiest, most gruesome, most horrific murder scene the world has ever witnessed.

My body trembled with unspilt tears of despair as I slowly removed my hand from my cardigan pocket. Each agonizing graze of skin against fabric felt almost excruciating. 

"Well?" Came Byakuya's demand, harsh and spiked with irritation at my speed. 

I wanted to tell him that I couldn't do it, that I was too afraid of the unknown. But before I could even open my mouth, Monokuma's sickly, high pitch, terrifying voice flooded the entirety of the room with its vulgarity. 

"For this investigation, I have unlocked the doors." He announced without any trembly flaws in his announcement at all. "Please look around to your heart's content!"

My blood froze into shatters of ice.

Investigation.

Investigation?

That could only mean one thing. What else causes an investigation to flare up and occur out of the blue?

I already knew the answer, I thought. I just didn't want to admit it to myself.

Byakuya seemed to know it as well. "A murder really did take place, huh?" He muttered, to himself, almost. It wasn't like I could hold up a conversation with him, anyway. I was too frightened to speak, too nervous to think, too disorientated to breathe. "Just as I thought."

Before I could even find the strength to ask him what that could have possibly meant, he brushed past me in such an unbothered, collected expertise.

Before I could even find myself, he pushed open the door to the girls locker room.

Before I could even find hope, Chihiro Fujisaki was dead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wtf the ending is so bad


	7. Chapter Six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Promises more fragile than glass.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> super long chapter ahead!! sorry

Sometimes, you just simply cannot recognize your own voice.

Whether it be giving a speech, or recording a video film, your voice always seem to sound as if it belonged to someone else. You don't recall ever sounding like that, yet you are the one saying these odd lipped words. The pitch is either too high or too low, the volume too loud or too soft, and you wonder if this voice really is yours.

That was how I felt the moment I walked in on the bloodiest crime scene I had ever seen.

I was screaming before I could even register the entire room, losing any strength I had left to support my weak legs. All I knew was if I saw blood, that meant somebody was dead.

And that somebody was none other than my friend Chihiro Fujisaki. 

Her arms were strung up against two twin benchpresses, suspending her lifeless, hollow body a few inches above the air. Her neck hung limply against her chest, no longer vigorous enough to even prop up her slack, crimson soaked head. If I could look past the immense amount of blood staining the snowy skin of her face, I could see her eyes: dull, wide, dead.

I forgot how to breathe. I was certain I screamed so long and hard, my lungs were beginning to retire. The shriek that was ripped out from my chest was animalistic, primal, as if I were never human to begin with. My heart, which had been pulsating to a rate faster than any record on Earth, had suddenly died to a complete halt, stopping every function of my body. My ears no longer echoed with the deafening sound of my blood, but rather, the hoarse cry of my own voice.

Seeing another dead human being triggered something wild and ancestral deep inside of me. It was almost like a natural instinct, but I couldn't seem to find a label for that feeling. All I knew was that I was overshadowed with inky, pure despair.

While I was over here, deteriorating down into hysteria, Byakuya didn't even seem to flinch at the sight of Chihiro's lifeless body. He remained perfectly calm and collected, despite the fact that a nightmare straight out of a horror manga laid right in front of our very eyes. He brushed past me on the floor, to stare pointedly at the bloodied, ashy corpse. He crossed his arms, lilting his head to the right the slightest.

"Most unusual, don't you think?" He deadpanned, not a single sliver of human emotion tracing his words. Simply, he pointed at her body, strung up like a limp puppet on a stage for us to watch. "Look. Chihiro's corpse has been suspended somehow. And something's been written on the wall, in blood..." His sentences paused for a brief moment as I picture he was trying to decipher the splash of crimson on the walls. "'Bloodlust'?"

From my position on the floor, my shaky eyes flickered to the wall behind him, struggling to focus on the memo. Due to my dizzying head, I had quite the amount of trouble making out the words, but after I swallowed thickly and continued to stare, I could start to see it take form. 

Bloodlust. It reminded me of the creepy messages scrawled onto the chalkboards of the school's classroom, only this time, red.

"Such a brutal way to kill someone," remarked Byakuya, as if he were merely reading it off of an educational website. He shook his head, disappointed, somehow. "No, this is beyond brutal. Wouldn't you agree?"

Even though he didn't bother to turn back and face me directly, I somehow knew he was directing his inquiry towards me. I could barely even hear my own grief stricken voice as I weakly responded, "T-They killed her. How could it _not_ be brutal?"

"No, that's not my point," he argued, letting his crossed arms fall slack to his sides. "This murder is far to bizarre for any everyday amateur to have committed it. Unlike with Sayaka, this murder was not a crime of passion or necessity. It's almost as if whoever did this, did it for fun." At last, he tilted his shoulder a bit to glare at me. "You see what I mean, don't you?"

No, I didn't see what he meant. I was still frozen in my state of raw shock, that everything he just said went in to one ear, and flooded out the other. Nothing was sticking to my reeling, aching head, as I was still trying to comprehend exactly what I had just saw. Death. Gone. I thought experiencing just one body discovery was enough; that was enough trauma for a lifetime.

But twice?

"Hey! I heard screaming!" A voice, bold, demanding, cut through my endless stream of frightened thoughts. "Did something-"

Before he could even finish his own sentence, Kiyotaka began to scream.

It was a bloodcurdling cry, a piercing shriek, a heart-stopping screech. I only heard pure, utter horror in his voice, mirroring that of my own.

He didn't, or rather, couldn't, stop screaming, even when a four note melody chimed faintly beneath the echoes of his wails. 

A cheery, bright melody, followed by a cheery, bright voice.

The monitor hanging inside the girls locker room glitched a dark sea green, then blinked to the usual canvas shot of Monokuma lounging in his chair. Sitting up straight, his beady little eyes stared right into the camera lens. He leaned in closer, a little bit, before commencing his announcement.

"A body has been discovered!" He pronounced. The wine glass resting in his paw was raised towards the sky, like a twisted, sickening toast of sorts to Chihiro's death. "After a certain amount of time, which you may use however you like, the class trial will begin!"

Thankfully, before he could traumatize me further, the monitor screen cut to black once again, and the loudspeakers were cut silent. I was left drowning in an ocean of my own thoughts, gasping for soundless breaths of air as I tried to swim away from the terror within me. I found no such luck.

"T-The body discovery announcement?" repeated Kiyotaka, his face white with sheer panic. His eyes, wide in dismay, continued to stare at Chihiro's body, still dripping with blood. "Then Chihiro really is...?"

"Dead, yes." Byakuya finished for him.

The haunting announcement from Monokuma only confirmed the worst nightmare of all: Chihiro Fujisaki was indeed deceased. 

Yet, just yesterday, perhaps not even hours ago, she was alive as any human could possibly be. She breathed the same air as I, walked down the same corridors, even _talked_ to me before her passing. It all felt so real, that I couldn't accept the fact that she had died. She was full of life, and now, she was nothing more than an empty, hollow shell, resembling nothing of the girl I used to know.

It was quick, too, too quick. We had barely spent any time at this school, and now, one of the most talented people in the entire nation, was gone in the span of a single night. Life, potential, talent, hope, was all taken away with one swift action of fatality. 

She never even got to show me the program she had been working on. 

I could hardly hear Byakuya's next snarky reply through my thick haze of mangled emotion. "Before you start screaming your head off, Taka, go round everyone up. It seems another game has begun."

"Game...?" My voice rasped against the hoarse walls of my parched throat.

"Another life-or-death game to uncover a killer," elaborated Byakuya, his voice completely flat. "Another chance to win, or lose this game. Sounds like fun, doesn't it?"

Kiyotaka, clearly alarmed by his words, couldn't muster another response. Instead, he chose to follow his commands, racing out from the locker room in a haste I'd never seen before. All the while, I remained on the cold, solid ground, still trying to understand why and how Chihiro was dead.

She promised to tell me more about her project. She promised she'd get stronger.

Were those heartfelt promises all thrown away, alongside her own life?

Too many questions took up the little space I had left inside my head. The rest of my brain was dominated by sensations of black roots of despair, digging into my mind until I could no longer see past the tendrils of misery. I would no longer hear her light laugh, see her shy smile, nor talk to her ever again. What even was my last conversation with her? Last interaction? Last sighting?

I tried, but couldn't seem to separate one thought from the other. They mixed all together into one murky, sticky puddle of dread. I could not even feel my soul resting inside my body.

"Come on," Byakuya's sharp, annoyed voice cut through my scattered daze. "Get up, cover girl. We need to start investigating as soon as everyone get here."

In some way, I managed to hear his demand, and slowly began to lift my hefty body from the rough, icy floor. My fingers bumped against the hard wood, crushing my bones the slightest. On unsteady feet, I somehow rose to a mountain pose, every inch of my body quivering. Once I got on my feet, I immediately shivered. From the cold or fear, I wasn't sure which one.

My hands flew to grasp my shoulders, pressing my arms and elbows tightly against my chest. My teeth chattered noiselessly as I stood planted in one place, unable to move my trembling legs. Beside me, Byakuya nudged his rectangular framed glasses higher up the bridge of his nose, narrowing his eyes as he wordlessly inspected the body at a distance.

I didn't understand how he could possibly be so calm in a situation like this. One of our friends, one of _us_ , had perished in such a horrible way, and he couldn't even let out a word of remorse. He just stood there, as if Chihiro never lived, as if she never mattered to us at all. This was all a game to him, and she was just a character.

Byakuya terrified me at times like these.

It did not take long at all for everybody to file inside the girls locker room, privacy and shame suddenly disappearing at the bloody sight of the atrocious crime scene. Blood splattered like child's paint, limp cadaver hung like a marionette, death like an overwhelming shadow. With each new person, a surprised and horrified scream would escape from their lips as they stared wide eyed at the fresh, crimson corpse.

"Damn!" spat Sakura, visibly enraged at herself as she clutched her large fist in fury. "I couldn't keep her safe!"

"Wh-What the fuck _is_ this?" Mondo yelled behind broad eyes as he entered the room, halting in his tracks as soon as he caught a glimpse of blood.

Hifumi couldn't keep his eyes on the body for more than a single second. "It's a dream! This is a dream! It's all just a dream!" He muttered over and over to himself, trying to convince his own mind.

When Kyoko came in, she was just as collected as Byakuya was. Although, she wasn't as creepy about it as he was, it seemed. "Another death, huh?" She pondered out loud, narrowing her lavender eyes down onto the corpse.

Celeste sighed, finding her way beside the purple haired girl. "Which means we are now in the same position once again."

"What is that?" Aoi's cry of alarm emphasized the last word of the sentence as she shakily pointed a finger at the bloody message slathered onto the pale violet walls. She stood glued to the doorway, a hand over her mouth as she meekly stared at such a horrific sight.

Immediately at her shout, Kyoko stepped over the blood stained carpet, aided with precise caution. She brushed past the body without any signs of disturbance, which impressed me to a great level, and peered in at the message. I, on the other hand, only stood and watched as she volunteered to check the writing out for her terrified classmates.

"I don't think it's any kind of dying message," remarked Kyoko, bending forward to observe the blood used to scrawl the memo. Her eyebrows furrowed in thought as she said, "It's just too...strange."

Kiyotaka, who appeared to have been finished with collecting everyone, gulped down a breath of uncertainty. "But you know...that thing about writing "bloodlust in blood," his ruby eyes flew all across the room before finally landing on the message. "Doesn't it sound kinda familiar?"

It did seem quite familiar, I had to admit. Something about the sloppy work of the letters, and the chilling word done so gruesomely, lit a flash of knowledge inside my head. There was no way I could ever look over this petrifying detail.

"Genocider Syo!" cried Yasuhiro, announcing the exact same answer I had inside my head.

We had conversed about Genocider Syo briefly in the past. Allegedly, they were the Ultimate Murderous Fiend, a serial killer whose identity has yet to be caught. Their grisly, bloody attacks always hit the top news, announcing the death of another innocent person. There was always a message left behind with the body: bloodlust.

"Then this is..." Aoi stammered from the door, her face growing ashen with realization. "Some copycat killer trying to imitate Genocider Syo's "style"?"

"But," my own voice snaked out from my chest in confusion. "Why would anyone do that?"

Byakuya's arms returned to his chest as he stared at the bloody letters. "Perhaps, it's the work of the real Genocider Syo."

"The real-" Yasuhiro's mind quickly spiraled into panic at those words. He rapidly began to sweat as he shrieked, "Wait, are you saying Genocider Syo is here in the school?"

Aoi's breath got caught in her throat, her eyes growing even wider. "N-No way!" She exclaimed.

"But going so far as to write 'bloodlust' at the scene," Celeste pondered with a finger to her chin. "I am surprised at their stupidity."

Sakura shook her head deeply with a sigh. "I can't image a worse situation than dealing with a stupid murderer."

I was about to say something resembling an agreement to that, but before I could even part my lips, I heard noisy, frantic footsteps creep up behind me. Afraid it really was Genocider Syo, arriving to slaughter us all, I whipped my head around instinctively at the sound. My hair, completely loose from my frenzied rush earlier that morning, lashed at my face before I could even see who it was that came in.

"Ah!" As I brushed my bangs from my face in irritation, I heard Aoi exclaim. "Toko!"

When I finally shoved away all of my thick, wavy hair, I saw that it was indeed Toko, standing beside Aoi in the doorway, her eyes wide and quivering in pure terror at the sight of the crime. Her mouth dropped agape, but nothing spill out other than a collection of strangled, forced sounds. Her face darkened when she began to back up slowly from the door, eyes still locked on the murder scene. 

"Nnnnnno..." she breathed, having clear difficulty in talking. "Wh-Why? Why?"

"T-Toko?" Aoi questioned meekly, but got no coherent answer.

"Why...?" That was the only thing Toko could say, over and over and over again. "Whywhywhywhywhywhywhywhy?"

With each "why" that slipped weakly from her mouth, her voice grew more and more faint, until I could no longer hear her words. I tried to tread forward to ask if she was alright, but I never got the chance to even do so. Without any warning at all, she fell to the ground, now completely limp.

"She fainted!" Yasuhiro screamed shrilly, jumping back in pure alarm at her sudden unconsciousness. "That did _not_ sound good!"

My own jaw dropped open in bewilderment, and I froze mid-step. I wasn't sure whether or not she had injured herself in dropping, but judging by the hollow sound her skull made from hitting the wooden planked floor, I made a presumption that it was pretty bad.

"Toko!" Aoi dropped to her knees with a yell, grabbing the aforementioned girl by the shoulders. Although she was collapsed on the ground, Aoi still tried to vigorously shake her awake, using quite the bit of strength too. "Toko, are you okay? Come on, wake up!"

Hifumi uncomfortably shuffled to the side to peer at the two on the floor. "Oh, that's right. I just remembered that she faints any time she sees blood. L-Like with Makoto."

I suddenly recalled her claiming that fact, just a few days ago, when Makoto had died inside the gymnasium under Monokuma's hands. Immediately after his punishment, Toko had fell to the bloodstained floor, insensible for a few moments at the mere sight of blood.

"Hemophobia, then?" added Celeste, folding her two hands on top of one another as she watched the scene unfold before her.

"I hope this isn't against the rules of sleeping outside her room..." muttered Yasuhiro, still not over the shock that she had just randomly passed out on the floor.

I frowned at the sight of a desperate Aoi trying to yank Toko awake. I didn't think Monokuma would go that far as to punishing students who passed out without their will. "No, I think it should be okay. The regulations prohibit "sleeping". Like, on purpose."

Yasuhiro instantaneously brightened at my answer, but before he could say a word of validation, Aoi's voice pierced through our short lived conversation once again. 

"Toko, can you hear me?" She continued to desperately call, shaking her shoulders frantically in attempts to wake her up. She knocked her knuckles gently against her slumped head. "Hey, you gotta wake up!"

Whenever I was asleep, I couldn't hear a single word spoken to me from the outside. However, things must've been quite different with Toko, because abruptly after Aoi uttered those words, she shot awake like a puppet on a spring, her movements still jerky from sleep.

I was certain I could hear a few cries and shouts of alarm at her sudden arousal, exchanging roughly through the death ridden air. I felt my own eyes broaden in place as I gawked at Toko, somehow standing straight from where she had been previously lying, her new posture completely out of her usual character. I had a complete loss for words at such an odd reaction, and my throat dried up in consternation. I tried to swallow, but almost choked instead.

"H-Huh?" Aoi, still on her knees, began to back away at the unexpected vigor from Toko. Her hands froze midair as she blinked furiously out of confusion. "What?"

For some reason unknown, Toko's stature was entirely different from her normal stance. Her tongue hung limply from her mouth as she wrung her hands of invisible water. "Sorry about that. I was just shocked, ya know? It happens, right? Was I the only one?"

She was saying too many words at once, and my jumbled mind could not keep up with the whole situation. I parted my lips, trying to force something of intelligence out, but what I said instead was, "T-Toko? Are you...okay?"

Tongue still dangling from her mouth, she turned and waved her hands towards me in a hurried dismissal. "I'm fine, I'm fine!" Her voice was around two octaves higher, with a thorn of ferocity hidden inside the chilling tone. Startled by her disturbing behavior, my feet shuffled backwards in attempts to remove me from her line of view. 

Toko's stormy grey eyes were hazed, dim, and dull. The previous luster resting in her eyes vanished alongside her consciousness, and even when her irises darted around the room to scout her surroundings, none of the ceiling lights ever reflected off of her pupils. It was as if her eyes were now black holes, drinking in luminosity so quickly, it was gone before you could even see it. I felt a shiver of pure intimidation chase down my spine at her menacing gaze of night.

When her jumpy vision landed on Chihiro's suspended corpse, blood still dripping down her legs, Toko's eyes widened at once. Yet, it wasn't out of fear, like previously. It was more like intrigue, surprise, and even a hint of amusement. "Whoa, is that a dead body?" She exclaimed, pointing rather childishly at the crimson soaked cadaver. "Hey! Are you dead?"

To finish the whole haunting performance off, she guffawed deeply at her own question, clutching her stomach as she howled with laughter. The entire tension of the room shifted into a concern deeper than how it originally was, and I could feel the unease resting inside of everybody here. Toko, who had been so terrified of blood, and meekly afraid of everybody, was now a whole on psychopath giggling at a murder. I did not know what exactly happened, but nonetheless, I was still horrified. 

"She must've hit her head _real_ hard when she fainted..." Yasuhiro gulped as he gazed vacantly at Toko.

In return, she let out another fit of wild laughter. "The world has a front and a back, a top inning and a bottom, a sea of truth and a web of lies!" She proclaimed, wiggling her fingers to add an effect of extra drama. 

Hifumi slowly began to back away from the odd girl. "This is..." He nibbled on the tips of his fingernails out of distress. "...Quite concerning. I mean, she sounds completely different!"

As if almost annoyed by our shared reaction, Toko flapped a single hand towards us. "No, no, no, everything's fine! At least the stutter's all gone." She paused to study her own remark before cackling yet again. "That's a good thing, right? Right?"

"It's clear to me that everything is _not_ fine!" Kiyotaka pointed a finger towards Toko's direction as he announced his words of truth. "Your eyes seem strangely vacant!"

Vacant. Her eyes were empty, completely drained and devoid of light. I could not bare to stare into those lifeless eyes for any longer, and I averted my gaze out of pent up discomfort.

Sakura briefly stared at Toko, who was still roaring with a fire of laughter, before stating, "It might be best if we take her back to her room for the time being."

Aoi unsteadily rose from her knees, her eyes shifting awkwardly to peek at Toko. "I don't mind taking her, but," she frowned in ponder, "could someone help me?"

"If you need help, I don't mind-" Hifumi began to declare, but was cut off as soon as he started to speak.

"Taka, could you help me?" Aoi turned to ask the other boy, acting as if she never heard Hifumi's offer.

Hifumi gasped, almost too dramatically for a rejection like this. "Huh? She totally ignored me!"

I knew exactly why she chose to dismiss him, but I figured it'd be best if I said nothing. 

"Very well." Byakuya glanced at Toko for less than a single second before turning away. "You take care of the girl, and the rest of us can begin the investigation right away."

I knew this feeling of dread far too well for comfort. The nauseating sensation nagging at the back of my head, whispering words of despair into my ear. One of our friends is dead, and another, was the killer. Two lives must be given up for the rest to continue on. I was thrown back into a whirlpool of sheer confusion and fear; no matter how much I tried to investigate a murder, I still could not understand a thing. I despised investigation with ever fiber of my being, but I couldn't avoid it, even if I tried. If I attempted to, I would be killed on the spot.

I refused to believe that my friend, Chihiro Fujisaki, was murdered by her own classmate. But there she was, or rather, there her body was, hung right in front of me for all to see. No matter how many times we call her name, no matter how hard we try, she will never talk again. Never.

The only thing we could do now was to avenge her death by finding her killer.

"Do we really gotta do another investigation?" Aoi's voice trailed off when the realization dawned onto her. Her eyes flew wide and she covered her mouth with both hands, eyes darting to Chihiro's dead body. "Examining the corpse of one of our friends. Having to suspect all our _other_ friends..." Her voice cracked with an abundance of suppressed emotion. "I hate this. I can't take it anymore!"

"I hate it, too!" Yasuhiro's wail chimed of agreement. He clutched his head with his hands out of distress. "I-I've had enough! I'm leaving this place!"

Byakuya scoffed at their trembling fear, irritated, almost. "Just accept it already." He snarled in a tone that was completely inhumane. His eyes glinted malice behind the frames of his glasses. "After all, blood is just a liquid. A dead body is a simple object."

"You are very...enthusiastic about all of this, are you not?" reflected Celeste, a small smile playing itself onto her lips.

"How can I not be?" Byakuya answered as if it were obvious. "If we don't unmask the culprit, we all die."

I hated to admit it, but he only spoke the truth. If we all stood here forever, cowering under the scent of death, we would soon contribute to the pile of collecting bodies as well. It was a simple matter of life or death, all battled in the field of the trial grounds. But Byakuya made it appear as if this whole situation was just a game to be played. He seemed more amused at the sound of investigating than determined to live.

"Th-That's true," I found myself saying. "But to jump into so soon-"

"What?" He cut me off from finishing my sentence with a short tempered snark. His eyes of ice narrowed down and glared at me until my nerves shuddered. "Do you _want_ to die?"

"No, I-" I tried to defend, but again, could not finish.

"Fine, then go off and die somewhere." His insults were like bullets against my skin, and I winced from his sharp edged insolence. "Right now, go ahead. You're a waste of space."

To that, I found no response lying on my tongue. I wouldn't say I took it to heart- he was rude to everyone, after all- but it did certainly hurt quite a bit. Shaking my head, I decided to not pick a fight with him, and let him glower with impertinence in dead silence. Luckily, I didn't need to say anything, because Mondo broke in soon after.

"A dead body is an...object?" He seethed, clenching his fist out of pure infuriation. I could see hot wrath begin to swirl inside of his eyes. "Chihiro wasn't an "object"! Show a little respect, or I beat some into you!"

Byakuya snorted at his threats. "You're welcome to try." He taunted.

I was afraid I would need to step in again in order to prevent the two from billowing into another fight, but fortunately for me, somebody else cut in before things got ugly.

"Everyone stop bickering." commanded Kyoko. Her voice was cool and still, heavily contrasting the voluminous fury of the other two. "Listen, there's some truth in what Byakuya said. If we don't solve the mystery and find the killer, our own lives are forfeit. And if Byakuya is right that Genocider Syo is somehow the one who killed Chihiro, then unless we do something, more victims could start piling up."

"M-More victims?" Hifumi yelped, beginning to stress. "What if he massacres us all, right here and now?"

"Stop it, man!" screamed Yasuhiro. "Now I'm scared!"

I was terrified of that too, I must admit. The mere thought of Genocider Syo, the country's most wanted serial killer, roaming the dim hallways of the school sent endless shivers down my back, freezing my blood into slivers of ice. And my horror was amplified even more by the sudden burst of energy from a voice I heard only in my nightmares.

Why, and how did he even come here?

Questions I had never got an answer.

"Hold on, hold on!" Came Monokuma's voice, so unanticipated, so noisy, that almost everybody in the room shrieked out of a jolting surprise. People flinched, some tripped, most screamed. As for me, I almost fell for the second time that day. 

"What the fuck?" yelled Mondo, clearly caught off guard. "W-What's Monokuma doing here?"

"If your worry is more victims, you don't gotta worry any longer!" Monokuma ignored his demands, waddling further inside the locker room. "In any one killing game, the guilty party may only kill a maximum of two people, remember?"

"What?" Hifumi echoed in a meek voice. "I don't remember any rule like that."

Monokuma shrugged in response. "I just came up with it." His elaboration was short, and certainly not sweet. "I mean, if one person went around and killed everyone, your lovely student life would be all over, right?"

"In that case," Sakura began slowly, her arms crossed against her burly chest. "Why not limit it to _one_ person?"

He sighed deeply, rocking back and forth on his black and white toes. "You're all smart! Come on, think about it!" He didn't give us the time to think about it, however, as he immediately began to explain after those words left his lips. "It makes things interesting, don't you think? I mean, in media, it's usually one killer, one victim per case. But the media's so, so boring!" He complained in a child-like whine of sorts. "So, I decided to spice it up, and give you the potential of _two_ victims in one case!"

"Spice it up?" I repeated. A flame of blazing rage tangled itself inside of me. "You want three people to die so you can "spice it up"? Just how fucked up are you?"

"Now, now, Miss Photoshop," he cleared all of my bubbling anger off with a swift wave of his white paw. "Don't get so angry at lil ol' me! Don't you have some investigating to do?"

To emphasize his point, Monokuma gestured to Chihiro's limp body, dangling just a few inched above the ground. I attempted to swallow my wrath, pushing it down with all of my might. I could not risk getting angry now; there was more serious matters to be taken care of, and my feelings would only cause complications.

Kyoko nodded. "Arguing with Monokuma is a waste of time," she said, despite the bear's groans and grumbles in refutation to her statement. "We need to start investigating right away if we want to avenge Chihiro."

"The Monokuma File is already updated in your handbook," clarified Monokuma as he began to trudge his way towards the door. He turned back a bit to wave at us, a maniac giggle laced in between his words. "Farewell for now! I'll catch you guys at the Class Trial!"

He was gone just as he had appeared, and we were left standing in a stunned silence once more. Confusion, anger, fear, all entangled together to form a cloud of worries above our heads. Our heavy minds drank in the new information with unease, and I felt my spirit sink lower than it ever had in my life.

"I can't say I understand his thinking," Celeste began. "But if what he said was true, then one more person's life could still be in danger."

"Which is definitely not good." Byakuya concurred, eyeing the body to his left. Using a finger, he pushed his glasses higher up the bridge of his nose. "We need to uncover the culprit before something else happens."

"YOU need to shut the fuck up!" growled Mondo, his glare still fixated on the heir. Something told me that their bickering will never cease, no matter how long we spent trapped together.

Aoi took a wavering step towards Toko, her fingers fidgeting at her sides and drumming against her thigh. "W-Well, for now, Taka and me are gonna drop Toko off at her room." She said, reaching out a hand to grab her arm.

"We will do our best to make sure Toko gets back safely!" Kiyotaka informed with brave clarity as he followed Aoi out of the room. "Do your best in investigation, everyone!"

The three filed out of the girls locker room, Aoi and Kiyotaka keeping both a hand and an eye on the disorientated girl. As their steps drew further and further from us, I could hear Toko say something about getting dropped off, and Aoi's voice informing her to calm down. I hoped that whatever happened to Toko wasn't as serious as I believed, and wished for her to return to normal as soon as possible. Maybe that hit on the head was enough to alter her personality completely.

Whatever the matter was, I couldn't afford to worry over it now. I told myself that Toko was in good hands, and that she would be alright. Currently, I had to point my focus on the investigation, and discover all the hidden truths of this murder.

"We have no time to stand around here." Celeste stated, her hand reaching inside one of the many pockets of her goth dress. When she slipped her arm out of the fabric, I could see that she had pulled out her own e-handbook from her dress. "We must begin our investigation tout suite. If we do not solve the mystery of who killed Chihiro," her face twisted into a familiar look of menace, similar to the one she wore when she reprimanded us of adaptation. "Then we will quickly follow her into the afterlife."

Although she was the proclaimed "Queen of Liars", I heard no lie in her words. If we wanted to live out our lives, survive in this hell of a school, we needed to push forward with all of our strength. To move on, for the sake of our lives and the ones of our dead classmates, we must find justice.

Just like last time, with Sayaka's murder, I reached into my jacket pocket and retrieved my student e-handbook. I didn't feel a buzz, or hear a notification bell, but the handbook must've updated itself, because the page count for both the Monokuma Files and the School Regulations, were increased by one. Using a finger, I tapped on the tab containing the Monokuma File.

I felt my heart sink into the deepest depths of misery when I saw Sayaka's profile, still there with all the information and notes, plastered onto the screen. It had been such a long time since I've seen her face. 

The next page held a display with an interface almost identical to Sayaka's. The screen was a blend of navy and black, with Hope's Peak logo was nestled in the top right corner. A portrait of Chihiro's face was to the left, a bright red 'X' crossed over her innocent face. A block of text laid right beside her picture.

My eyes quickly scanned the words to the right, my eyebrows furrowing as I took in the case's details.

"The victim was Chihiro Fujisaki." I murmured the sentences out loud as I read. "The time of death is estimated to be around 2 AM. The body was discovered in the girls locker room, on the second floor of the school. The cause of death was a blow to the head with a blunt object. She was killed instantly."

Again, there was little information leading to the culprit. I couldn't complain; it was like that every time. I figured that part was left up to us to discover, using only what was given and what we saw. That was called investigation.

As I stared blankly at the little white words on the screen, squinting my eyes and trying to decipher the notes, I heard footsteps tread up to stand in front of me.

"Hey, Junko." I lifted my head to see Byakuya, towering over me with a glare inside his cold eyes. "Do you have a second?"

"Huh?" My hands lowered, and I was stuck in confusion as to why he suddenly decided to approach me, after insulting me just mere minutes ago. "Did you need something from me?"

"Of course." He was still as blunt as ever when he stared me down, intimidating me into giving him what he wanted. "Life without purpose is quite dull, you know?"

That didn't fully answer my question, so I tried again. "Um, so what did you need?"

He scoffed once again, his pointed gaze never faltering even once. "I'm going to let you cooperate with me during my investigation." He said, almost too easily.

To say I was perplexed was an understatement. I blinked unintelligently and tried to comprehend his odd choice of words. He wanted me, of all people, to assist his investigation?

"H-Huh?" I ended up saying, still struggling to understand such simple requests. It was just so out of character for him to ask, that I believed he was kidding.

"I'm purchasing your talent." He sounded exasperated that I could not discern the offer. "The same talent which allowed you to solve Sayaka's case."

"S-Solve...?" My voice trailed off as I recalled the first class trial. I didn't really do too much, I thought. After all, it was Kyoko who helped me even comprehend the basics of the case. "No, I just-"

"You seem to have some limited use," pressed Byakuya. "Which is why I've chosen you. You have the honor of contributing to my investigation."

He still sounded rather arrogant in his invitation, but I had little reason to decline. Out of everybody in the class, Byakuya and Kyoko seemed the most headstrong when it came to solving mysteries. Perhaps, with Byakuya beside me, I could get a better grasp on this case than if I did so by myself.

I gave him a nod of understanding, although I think it seemed rather meek than determined, if anything.

"Now then," he remarked. "Shall we get started?"

My eyes jumped across the room, uneasy and disturbed as I drank in the crime scene. There was so much to uncover, and so little to comprehend, and I hadn't the slightest idea on where to begin. I swallowed dryly before saying, "Um, where should we start then?"

It appeared that this was going to be a complicated partnership, as he sighed crossly and shot a glare at the remaining students lingering in the locker room. "I'll examine the crime scene. You go collect the accounts of everybody here."

Of course, he made _me_ do all the difficult talking, while he actually got to investigate the murder. I didn't expect too much from him though, so I merely nodded to show my halfhearted agreement, and began to make my way to the nearest student without a word.

From the looks of it, Mondo and Sakura naturally took over guarding the crime scene once again. The two of them stood around the murder scene, eyes darting everywhere but the body. I could feel the thick, indestructible cloud of tension that settled over the two of them, and I hesitated to break it. My weight was shifted from one foot to the other as I contemplated on what to say.

What could I really say in this moment? Sorry that our friend has died? How are you feeling right now? Nothing I conjured up seemed fitting for a situation like this.

The one closest near me was Mondo, so I figured I should shoot my chances at a conversation with him. Although I feared what the response might be, I falteringly walked up to his side anyways. I couldn't afford to be reluctant at all if I desired the truth.

From here, I could see that his face was ashen with a veil of pure despair, his eyes dark with mourn. It was impossible to tag a single emotion on his expression; it was a blended mixture of blue and grey, hopelessness, grief, regret, and anger all in one. It was the face of someone truly miserable.

"So, um," I tried, but lost all of my mental notes on conversation at once. I could feel the heat rise to my face in sheer embarrassment of my lack of coherence. 

Thankfully for me, Mondo knew that I wanted to talk to him about Chihiro. His fingers slowly curled into a shaky, trembling fist, and for a split second, I was afraid that he was going to unleash a tangent of raw rage. Bracing myself, I winced at seemingly nothing. But, much to my surprise, he unclenched his right fist with disinclination, and a quivery sigh left his lips.

"Dude had a real complex about being weak," he began to speak in a voice I've never heard him use. It sounded so pained, so broken, that I could not believe it was coming from Mondo Owada himself. "You heard Chihiro talk about it, right? All "I need to get stronger!'"

He didn't bother to meet my eyes, which I understood to a great extent. Chihiro and Mondo did seem rather close friends, and I couldn't imagine how much heartache he was experiencing after her unjustly death. My gaze dropped to stare into the murky reflections of the fluorescent ceiling lights, sparkling inside the wooden floors.

"Yeah, I do remember she said that more than once." I agreed, but my words came out as slow and thick as honey. They felt heavy on my tongue, and I couldn't speak like how I normally did.

Mondo let out another breathy exhale, shivering of obvious hurt. "Sure did. Which..." he swallowed with difficulty as he gestured to the rest of the locker room, "I guess explains the trip down here."

I found myself frowning at his statement, perplexity heaving down my mind. "But, did she really need to get stronger that badly? I haven't met many girls who were _that_ determined to be strong."

In response, Mondo let out a choked noise from his scratchy throat and he shook his head from side to side. "I dunno. Haven't really thought about that stuff."

I wanted to question him whether or not he knew the cause of Chihiro's complex, but the glassy look in his eyes said too much about his shattered state of mind. I decided it'd be better if I didn't pressure him into talking about things he didn't like, so I gave him a quiet thanks for his account, which he returned with only a small nod of his head. 

Chihiro's unbreakable will to get stronger was what left her dead inside the locker room. I couldn't help but feel enraged at myself for not noticing it earlier. There were so many clear signs of her wanting to become stronger, and without a doubt, she would try training inside the girls locker room. But I hadn't picked up on that at all.

If I did, would I have offered to help?

If I did, could I have accompanied her, and even prevent her murder?

It was no use. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't shove away the overwhelming sense of guilt hanging over my shoulders. Chihiro considered me a friend, and yet, I was a coward who did nothing to help. I should have talked to her more, I should have spent more time with her. Because now, she was utterly gone, and I could never converse with her ever again.

"You look troubled, Junko."

I hadn't noticed that I'd been pacing around, back and forth, when I bathed myself in self loathing. The deep, gentle voice coaxed me out from my concerns, and I lifted my weary head to meet its owner. Sakura stood just a few feet away from Chihiro's body, which had now been surrounded by a few wandering students. She gazed down at me with worry glittering inside her pale cyan eyes.

"Ah, well," Again, I was struggling to find a conversation starter. "I...feel really bad. About Chihiro's death, I mean."

She gave a nod of understanding, which eased my anxiety just a bit. "I'm sure we all feel the same way," she let out a hefty sigh of grief, shaking her head in deep disappointment. "I use this locker room all the time. Now, it's become the site of Chihiro's death. I feel regretful: if I had stayed longer last night, perhaps I would have stopped the murder from happening here."

"D-Don't feel bad about that!" I tried to reassure her. "This isn't your fault. Maybe she could have been killed somewhere else, then carried here. If that was the case, you couldn't have prevented it, whether you were in the locker room at that time or not."

I was trying to convince myself on that part, too.

"You may be right," Sakura admitted, crossing her arms as she eyed the entirety of the locker room. "But still, I think she came here on her own free will. She had been talking a lot about wanting to get stronger, right? So, maybe she came here to exercise."

I frowned, slipping a hand into the pocket of my jacket unconsciously. The weight of my e-handbook seemed to grow heavier as I objected with, "But according to the Monokuma File, apparently she was killed around two in the morning. Would she really have been exercising that late?"

She appeared to ponder this for a brief moment. "Hina or myself are usually in the locker room during the day. So she was probably avoiding it then."

I blinked out of puzzlement. "Avoiding?" I echoed.

"Although we invited her to join us more than once," Sakura elaborated while she gazed around the room, cramped with a dozen of investigating high school students. "She never showed up. So I can only assume she was trying to avoid us."

"And instead, she came to exercise in the middle of the night?" The timing was still fuzzy inside my brain, but I was trying my best to understand the incomprehensible. 

Sakura nodded once to show her concurrence. "Perhaps. But it's difficult for me to imagine she would have come alone." Her ivory eyebrows furrowed across the tawny skin of her forehead. "She did want to start exercising, but she specifically mentioned she couldn't do it by herself. She needed support from others."

I was busying myself with jotting mental notes in my head, listing and making record of everything I've collected so far. "So," I began, attempting to burn her account into my memory. "You're saying she could have come here in the middle of the night to train in secret. But, that would also mean she would have come with someone else."

"It's a possibility, I think." stated Sakura, seemingly agreeing with my theory. 

Having all loose ends tied with Sakura, I bid her goodbye and left her to guard the scene alongside Mondo. I stood glued to the center of the locker room, narrowing my eyes as I thought over my collection of thoughts. From what I've gathered from Sakura and Mondo, Chihiro had been adamant about working out and getting stronger, and came into the girls locker room to exercise. She did it during nighttime, when nobody else was around. That part was still unclear for me, but I figured she'd have her own reasons for avoiding the other girls. And there was a possibility that somebody had accompanied her in working out.

I was almost certain that whoever it was, must be the culprit. Not many people were awake that early in the morning, hence our self proclaimed nighttime rule. From the looks of it, Chihiro and her mystery support friend were the only ones to go out during the night hours. If Chihiro was killed at two in the morning, still nighttime, then our list of suspects would narrow down to the only people awake during that hour. 

That part was easy enough to comprehend, but figuring out _who_ it was, was quite the challenge indeed.

If I wanted to figure that out, I thought with a wordless grimace. I would need to continue questioning people for their knowledge.

Celeste was the next person lingering inside the girls locker room. She, alongside Kyoko and Byakuya, were gathered around Chihiro's limp, bloodied body, each examining a part of the crime scene. As Byakuya had commanded, I needed to collect the accounts of everybody I could possibly talk to. So, I leaned in just a bit closer, and said, "Hey, Celeste, can I have a word with you?"

At the sound of her name, Celeste turned around from where she had been standing, and faced me with that elegant smile of hers. "Yes, Junko? What is it that you need?"

I glanced around the room with a few scans of my eye, and beckoned her to follow me into the nearest corner of the room. Without a complaint, or even a word, she followed me until we were isolated in one narrow section of the room. 

Her crimson eyes seemed as piercing as ever as she stared me down in a one sided match staring contest. The light inside the room did not caress her face, and her features were bathed in a moonless shadow of sorts. I tried to hold my composure, remembering her aggressive attitude during breakfast from the day prior.

"Is it about the case?" She inquired, and stole the words right from my mouth as if she were psychic. I was sure I showed some sign of stupefaction, because she merely giggled into one pale hand at whatever my reaction was.

"Y-Yeah," I breathed out, beginning to regret talking to her alone. I was sure nobody else could hear us in this corner, which either disturbed or assured my spirit. "What do you know?"

"Ah, so you want to know my account, yes?" She twirled a loose strand of her bangs around her finger, playing with her dark hair mindlessly as she spoke. "Well, I guess I shall tell you, and only you. Last night, I saw her."

"Her?" I repeated, my mind juggling a hundred thoughts in one hand. "Chihiro, right?"

Celeste nodded in confirmation. "I was checking out all the supplies in the warehouse, food, clothes, everything one could possibly need. Then, right before nighttime, Chihiro walked in to the warehouse."

My eyes widened at these new details. I couldn't have ever guessed that Chihiro would be hanging around in the warehouse, so I was glad there was an eyewitness to explain it all. My conscience informed me that important information must be lying in these few minutes. "What? Really?"

"She was holding a duffel bag with a blue tracksuit inside." elaborated Celeste. "I asked her what she was doing out so late, and she said that she was going to exercise. It appeared as if she was in quite a hurry too, as she stuffed the jacket into her bag hastily. It was almost like she was trying to hide it." She sighed, and let go of her hair, allowing the inky strand to fall back onto her cheek. "And just like that, she was gone."

My head was swarming with new facts and information, and it was a useless attempt to try and write it all down. Piecing together all of the accounts, I formed a jumbled, misshapen hypothesis of some kind: Chihiro, who wanted desperately to become stronger, went to the warehouse to pick out a tracksuit and duffel bag, and then headed to the girls locker room to exercise at night. There were still huge gaps left missing in my judgement, but what else could I possibly fit in? I hadn't talked to everyone yet, and there was still the Class Trial left to discuss the whole situation. For now, I just relied on my intuition.

"I assumed she was merely stocking up to go exercise in the morning," Celeste continued in her speech, her tone laced with a bitter vexation and disappointment. "But it would appear she ignored the nighttime rule, and headed directly to the girls locker room. If she hadn't broken our rule, none of this would have happened."

I wanted to reprimand her that everybody had a different reason for doing what they did, but it seemed to me that she wouldn't listen to my words. I guess Celeste would just always be like this, forcibly scolding others for their refusal to adapt to her desired lifestyle. I didn't bother saying any more, and instead thanked her for her rather useful information.

I could not see anyone else I could question inside the room, other than Kyoko, who was obviously absorbed in searching Chihiro's lifeless body, so I decided to do some investigating on my own. After making note of Celeste's witness account of Chihiro last night, I shuffled closer to the crime scene, one step at a time.

It was a struggle, trying to meet my eyes to her corpse. I couldn't see Chihiro's face, since her head was drooping all the way down to her chest, and I found myself feeling quite glad that it was. I did not want to see her final moments before death, and I did not want to gaze into her dull, hopeless eyes that were long deceased.

It was a painful reminder that everybody's life here was so, so fragile. A person among us was willing to murder a fellow classmate, all for the protection of one single secret. If they were willing to go to such extremes, then I definitely felt unsafe here. Feeling myself shudder in response, I peeled my mind away from the thought of death, and focused it onto the wall in front of me.

Just a few inches from the wall, were Chihiro's limp hands, each strung up beside her head. They were snowy, completely devoid of blood nor life, and so, so cold. Around her wrists were a series of knots from a long, thin white rope, bounding her hands to the bench press in a crucifix position. At least, it appeared to be rope at first. But when I peered a bit closer, I could see a plug of sorts hanging from one end of the rope.

It wasn't a rope at all. No rope I'd ever seen bore an electric plug like that. This appeared more like a lamp cord, or a wire rather than rope. That distinctive feature was quite puzzling. Why would there be an extension cord rather than rope used? None of it was making any sense, but I hadn't expected it to. Sighing, I pulled away.

There was a poster hanging just above Chihiro's left arm, the corners stained with crimson blood. On the poster, was a female supermodel, wearing a two piece black bikini and striking a rather erotic pose. It took me by surprise, not because the blood splattered all over the face, but because of the model depicted on the surface. It didn't seem like something you'd find in the girls locker room, and the poster felt quite odd to me. 

To confirm my strange feeling towards the poster, I approached Sakura once again for questions. "Hey, Sakura. You use this locker room a lot, right?"

She nodded, not mentioning why I had another inquiry for her. "I've used it nearly every day since it opened up. Sometimes, Hina and I use it together."

"Okay, so lemme ask you something," my eyes flickered to the wall behind us and I pointed at the lascivious poster. "Has this poster always been here in the girls locker room?" 

She squinted at what I was gesturing to, trying to figure it out, then shook her head deeply. "Sorry, I can't really say. I never really paid any attention to the poster here."

"I see..." Still, there was something off about that poster, but I couldn't seem to pinpoint what it was. I was almost positive that such a model should belong to the mens locker room, not the girls. Yet, I wasn't certain if that was the case if I didn't check for myself.

"But there _is_ something that's been bothering me about the locker room," added Sakura, grabbing my attention span once more. I looked up, surprised and a little curious, if I had to admit. "You see, I like to drink a little protein coffee every time I finish exercising. And the other day, when I was done working out, I spilled some on the carpet in the girls locker room, and it left a stain."

"A stain?" My gaze dropped to study the grey carpet beneath my feet. It was a bit rough, solid, but clean, other than the obvious bloodstains. There was no sign of a stain at all. "But I don't see any stain on the carpet now."

Sakura nodded at my observation. "Exactly. I noticed it earlier: the stain has disappeared. I can only assume that somebody came here last night and cleaned it up. But still," she narrowed her eyes down at the fresh, spotless carpet. "Isn't it unusually clean? As if there was never a stain here to begin with."

She was right. The carpet did look unnaturally clean, and even if somebody did wipe it off, what for? From my knowledge, Sakura was alone last night while exercising. Was this the handiwork of the killer?

I thanked Sakura yet again, apologizing for being so nosy, but she dismissed it and reassured me that it was quite alright. Once she returned to guard duty of the crime scene, I was left in a shower of my own wonders. The disappearing stain, the strange poster, it wasn't adding up at all. I had a nagging suspicion in the back of my head as I pondered, and it took me a while to decide that I'd take a look inside the boys locker room for affirmation.

Soundlessly, I slipped out of the purple tinted locker room, and snuck inside the boys changing room with ease. Since it was currently an investigation going on, there was no need for me to be afraid of the giant Gatling gun overhead. Still, I felt a chill rush up my spine as I pushed open the door and stepped inside.

The boys locker room was almost identical to the girls', except the walls were painted a light blue instead of violet. There were two benchpresses, fake plants, a monitor and camera, and even a boxing bag in the center. Similarly, there should be a poster inside as well, right? My gaze flitted to my left, where the benchpresses sat neatly. On the wall behind them, was indeed another poster.

I jogged up to inspect the sheet closer, my eyebrows furrowing in confusion. This poster contained a photograph of the popular boy band called Tornado. I had heard about this group a lot; several of my female coworkers have had their hearts stolen by the members through love songs and astonishing looks. Clearly, they were meant for a mostly female audience. I frowned, reaching to touch the smooth poster face. Then, why would it be in a boys locker room?

The odd placing of the two posters puzzled me to no end. A female supermodel in the girls locker room. A boy band in the boys locker room. It seemed as if they should be switched in order to make sense. I sighed once again, becoming more and more frustrated and perplexed by this entire case. Pulling back, my shoulders sagged and my eyes met the floor in defeat.

As I did, I eyed the stony carpet beneath my platform boots. It appeared to be from the same factory as the one in the girls locker room, sharing its tough grey surface and long perimeter. But, when I looked closer, there was a dark brown stain of sorts on the surface.

A stain. Just like what Sakura said.

Did somebody switch these two items between rooms?

It did seem plausible, but what for? Did the killer do this? My heart rammed inside my chest for reasons unknown. I had too many questions, and too little answers in reply. To discover more, I had to return to the crime scene for confirmation. And so, I departed the boys locker room with more worries clouding my head than ever, and snuck back inside the girls locker room without a noise.

When I made my way back to the crime scene, I made another note on the posters and the carpet. The girls locker room carpet was undoubtedly devoid of stains, while the boys locker room did not. What this meant, I hadn't a clue. I tried to push away the contradictions in my head for a less murky consciousness. I shook my head. I needed to focus on the actual murder scene, first and foremost.

The violet tinted wall of the girls locker room, just behind Chihiro's suspended body, was slathered in crimson blood, still wet. The word "bloodlust" was scribbled onto the tile, in a manner so messy, it was clear that it was done with a finger. I shivered under the glare of the red words, taunting my soul with the presence of a serial killer in the school's halls. Was this really done by Genocider Syo? 

If so, then we had a much bigger problem on our hands. Even though a new regulation has been added to our endless list of rules, one more person was still vulnerable to the hands of murder. Whether Genocider Syo was lurking somewhere in the dark depths of the academy, or they were even among us students, it still chilled me to the bone. I'd never, ever want to meet a murderer in real life, I decided.

Staring at the blood soaked message for too long was beginning to nauseate me, so I stepped a few feet backwards to avoid reading it again. Unfortunately for me, my back heel stepped onto something hurly and bulky, and I almost slipped onto the ground from my trip. Stumbling awkwardly, it took me a moment to regain my footing and find my balance once more. On instinct, I shot a glare down at the unknown object that aided in my fall, and ended up staring at a huge, black iron dumbbell.

The weight rolled slightly around from my impact before swirling to a complete stop at the edge of the grey rug I was standing on. My breath quickly became lodged in my sore throat as I recognized the horrifying bloodstain splashed onto one end of the inky dumbbell. Without a single doubt, this object had something to do with Chihiro's murder.

Seeing that I was staring at the dumbbell rather intensely, Byakuya spoke up from beside me, "The Monokuma File said "a blow to the head with a blunt object" is what killed her." To emphasize his point, he pointed a finger down at the bloodied dumbbell.

Unlike last time, I didn't dare to actually kneel down and touch that thing. "Does that mean this dumbbell was actually the murder weapon?" I tried to confirm by asking a simpleminded question.

"I don't imagine it could have been anything else." answered Byakuya.

My gaze remained fixated onto the dumbbell, tracing every curve and bend with my eyes as I inspected it through and through. It was obvious that this was the murder weapon, which means that the culprit must've obtained inside the locker room. I felt myself blink as I submerged my consciousness into ponder. That also supported the theory that whoever went to exercise with Chihiro last night, was the killer.

My mind immediately began to make a list of suspects. Somebody had to have been awake at two in the morning, and they should have been a girl in order to access the girls locker room. That cuts down the number of accusations quite largely, almost half. Yet, almost no one had testimonies from last night, so my list was rather broad, much to my disappointment.

I didn't even notice that I was murmuring to myself until Byakuya provoked me with, "How long are you going to just stand there and ramble to yourself? We need to move on."

"H-Huh?" My head instantly shot up from where it hung out of bewilderment. "Already?"

He gave me an unimpressed look that made my ego shrivel up. "New clues won't magically appear by standing around here. We need to check every aspect of this case."

"Th-That's true, but-"

"The more you try to argue, the less time we have for investigation." He scoffed and turned his back onto me coldly. "Just hurry up so we can proceed."

He didn't even bother to wait for me to respond to that harsh comment, as he was already half out the door once he finished speaking. I was left standing in the midst of a bloody crime scene, now partnerless, and heaving a heavy sigh from my chest. Shaking my head, I mumbled something incoherent about Byakuya being a bad partner, and, against my will, trudged after his trail.

Using a firm hand, I swung the deep maroon door of the girls locker room open to step out into the foyer. I was expecting Byakuya to be standing out in the halls already, too short of patience to wait for me, but much to my surprise, he remained there in the green common room. I slid the door shut behind my back and glanced around the area, eyes narrowing in confusion.

"So, are we supposed to be here, or...?" My voiced trailed off as I began to rack my brain for an answer. Why would the pool foyer be relevant to Chihiro's murder?

"Figure it out for yourself." He retorted, which I took as a reluctant yes. He gestured towards the two doors to our left with a hand. "I'll give you a hint: check the doors."

"The doors?" I echoed his words, to which he scoffed pettily. Judging from his statement a few moments prior, I assumed he didn't have the forbearance to sit around and answer all of my half hazarded inquires. I wasn't expecting a reply anyways, so instead, I made my way towards the door I had just exited from: the girls locker room door.

My eyes followed alongside the design etched into the dark pink wood, drinking in the intricate carvings and patterns. After staring at the door for around a solid minute, I realized with disgruntlement that I couldn't make any sense of his so called "hint". I was tempted to give up, but then my gaze landed onto the dark card reader to the right.

Bending over slightly, I tapped a finger against the hard metal, emanating a hollow sound from the impact. "If I remember right, this card reader is meant to work with our handbooks, right?"

"Do you have an issue with it?" Byakuya suddenly interrogated me with an unexpected question. When I turned around, I could see another icy glare resting inside his eyes. "If so, you should take it up with Monokuma."

"N-No, I don't think that's-" I began, but was quickly interrupted when he abruptly clapped his hands together. The loud, piercing noise was enough to falter my words and lodge them into my throat, still scratchy from screaming earlier. It was enough to slaughter the tranquility of silence and change it into a quietude of dread. It was also enough to bring forth Monokuma from the pool foyer's doors.

I didn't know _how_ he could listen and hear everything we say, much less appear from seemingly nowhere. It was like as if Byakuya had domesticated the robotic bear to do whatever the heir wants. At his command, Monokuma came waltzing in from the purple stained doors, shuffling up to the two of us with much more excitement than necessary.

"You called for me?" cheered Monokuma, rocking back and forth on his two toned feet.

"It seems that Junko has a question for you." Byakuya nodded his head towards my direction, and suddenly, Monokuma's tiny little eyes were now trained on me. Even though he was a good three feet shorter than I was, I still felt the waves of intimidation pouring out from his stare.

"Sure, what's up?" He said.

"Umm, well," I forcefully swallowed any remaining signs of anxiety. "It's just about this card reader." I clacked my fingernails onto the hard, shiny surface of the machine once again.

Monokuma nodded, quite eager to explain his creation. "Yes, the card readers have all been designed to interface with each of your e-handbooks! You can only enter the locker room corresponding to the gender listed in your individual handbook."

"And it's impossible for two people in a row to go through while the door is unlocked, correct?" pressed Byakuya in a tone more demanding than curious.

At even the mention of such deeds, Monokuma tensed immediately, his villainous red eye flashing ruby light out of infuriation. Suddenly, he became ten times more frightening than usual, which was saying a lot. "If there were some sort of erotic terrorist on the prowl, then the ceiling-mounted Gatling gun would initiate a Swiss cheese slaughter!"

I almost forgot all about the huge weapon hanging just mere inches above my head. His chilling reminder caused me to scoot a few feet away from under the glare of the Gatling gun.

"And the school regulations prohibit anyone from lending someone else their handbook, correct?" Byakuya continued without showing even the slightest bit of disturbance at the suggestion of a brutal execution.

"Correctly correct!" Monokuma's grave demeanor melted away into a much softer and childish one, as if he were switching personalities. "It's the new rule I implemented a couple days ago!"

"So," started Byakuya, stealing the words right from my mouth. "What we're assuming is this: since Chihiro was found in the girls locker room, the killer must have been able to get in there. As such, the killer must be one of the girls, right?"

"Right..." I felt my body temperature rise and fall to intense extremes. All of the clues we've been gathering so far was chipping away the veil of mystery on this case. Because the only way to get inside a respective locker room is through the handbook, the killer had to have been a girl as well to kill Chihiro in there. My hands clutched the ends of my skirt until the fabric nearly ripped. 

"But," My head vigorously snapped upwards at the sudden oppose. Byakuya smirked a knowing grin at my puzzlement, as if he knew something much bigger than the obvious. "The rules state this: "Loaning your e-handbook to another student is strictly prohibited.'" He had repeated the regulations word for word. "Yet only the act of _loaning_ a handbook is prohibited. Borrowing someone else's is perfectly fine."

"W-What?" My eyes broadened at his bold statement. It was a twisted one, for sure, mended from the clear lines of the rule. But, I couldn't seem to find anything incorrect inside his proclamation.

Monokuma unleashed a fit of manic laughter. "I would expect nothing less from the prodigal son of the noble Togami family! So, you've managed to find the loophole in the regulations!"

Even after being somewhat praised by the bear, Byakuya still scoffed at his sentences. "Knowing you, I would bet you created it on purpose. To add a little excitement to things."

"You know me so well!" Monokuma's tone dripped with pleasure and thrill. "I can't help it, y'know. Regular rules are so boring, so I decided to spice mine up a little! Since the dead can't actually talk, they're not people anymore. They're things!" He tilted his head to the side as he darted his gaze from my mystified expression to Byakuya's stony face. "Get it? Got it? Good."

"Wait," This entire thing surrounding the rules was clouding my head in an ocean of perplexity. "But, to borrow someone's handbook, wouldn't that mean-"

"I said, "Got it?'" Monokuma seethed with vulgarity, and I felt all of my confusion disintegrate out of pure terror. "No more questions! Get your shit together and figure it out on your own!"

I wasn't sure what I could have possibly said to anger Monokuma, but whatever it was, it was enough for him to storm out of the room, leaving Byakuya and I alone once again. And I still had no answer to my previous question.

"Well," began Byakuya with a rather amused look across his face. "I know you are unfortunately lacking in mental faculties, so I'll fill you in myself." I tried to ignore his pointed insults when he shot a glance towards me. "Let's head to the main hall."

That one caught me off guard. "The main hall...?" I heard myself repeat, hoping he'd offer at least some sort of elaboration. 

Unfortunately for me, he did not. Instead, he replied with an even more ambiguous answer than before. "That'll help you understand what's going on."

I didn't know why or how going to the dining hall would help me understand the function of student handbooks, but I couldn't find the words to argue when he led us out the pool foyer. Slowly, yet quite hastily, we navigated out from the pool area and through the endless labyrinth of dimly lit corridors. With every step I took in front of me, I could feel a chill run down my spine. This chill had no particular reasoning; it could be because one of my friends had just been murdered by another, or it could be the fact that a serial killer is roaming our halls. Then again, it could be because of the soon coming Class Trial, where once again, we would have to fight our ways to live. 

I never thought I'd be in this horrifying position again, yet here I was.

We climbed down the flights of stairs in dead silence. I could feel my own fear holding me back from speaking. It was a terror so inhuman, that it felt too much for my body alone to handle. My arms grew goosebumps, my legs shivered, and my skin began to sweat. By the time we finally arrived at the main hall on the first floor, I was ready to pass out once more.

The enormous, daunting gate blocking the entrance didn't help my unease either. It sat there, heavy and solid, reminding me of our demise inside this prison of a school.

The rest of the hall was painted in various shades of dull grey, making the whole atmosphere more harrowing than ever. The walls were carved so that arches and pillars alike would appear. To my right, I could see a set of whiteboards, oddly standing beneath the dim lights that bathed the room in an eerie glow. If I squinted hard enough, I could just barely make out the rigid shapes of a dozen photographs and magazine slips, pasted onto the surface.

Beside the board nearest to the gate, was a wooden structure, almost like a table or a desk, holding a metal drawer on its surface. As I tried to study the object further, Byakuya brushed past me to open up the cabinets with a free hand. I couldn't help but feel intrigued by this, so I jogged up to him in following.

"I happened to find these by chance myself the other day," he reached into the drawer, which now, up close, resembled a mailbox. When he lifted his hand, I could see three student e-handbooks resting in his grip. 

"E-handbooks?" I peered in closer in attempts to make it all make sense. 

"It seems there's a system in place where the handbooks of dead students get "delivered" to this mailbox," explained Byakuya. He tossed one to me in an aggressive way, and I almost dropped the gadget while trying to catch it. "Turn it on."

At his command, I pressed a finger to the on button, and the dark screen of the handbook began to flicker with light. The Hope's Peak logo flashed a neon blue, before fading its opacity in the background. The foreground was now taken up by the owner's name, printed in neat white letters: "Sayaka Maizono".

"This is...Sayaka's handbook." I gaped at the digital display in awe, watching as the home page blinked on like usual. I could see tabs of regulations, Monokuma Files, and everything in between.

"Now do you understand?" I heard Byakuya say to me. "This is the key to the loophole I revealed earlier."

My thumbs played around with the cool surface of the handbook as I slowly took in his words. Technically, I thought to myself. The dead students can't loan their handbooks to anyone. But the rules don't forbid using one without their knowledge or consciousness. To borrow a dead student's handbook wasn't specifically prohibited in the school regulations. 

"Hm?" came Byakuya's voice again from my right. He was staring at the other two handbooks; one of which was illuminating a soft blue glow, and the other, blank. "Hold on a second."

I lowered my hands. "What's wrong?"

"That's strange." He held up the dead handbook for me to see. "One of the handbooks won't turn on."

Sure enough, the face of the gadget was completely black, and remained that state even after Byakuya tried to turn it on in various ways. I could see him frown in a mixture of frustration and intrigue as he shook the device up and down.

"Is it broken?" I asked. "Whose is it?"

He passed the blank handbook to me for a try. I attempted to boot it up, but the power button was wholly dead. I got no such response from my fruitless efforts.

"The other handbook showed Makoto's name when I started it up," he pitched in, watching me try to turn the e-handbook on. "So this must be Leon's."

I stacked the two devices in my hands on top of one another, trying to think and ponder to my extent. "But...why would it be broken?"

"He did get pummeled with dozens and dozens of baseballs." Byakuya reminded me without much emotion in his voice. "It would make sense."

Dozens and dozens of baseballs.

Those were used to ultimately murder Leon in a form of a heartless execution.

Even days after his death, I could still hear the sound of rubber clashing against flesh, blood splashing hollowly onto the grimy floor. The ceaseless noise that made home inside my ears turned out to be Leon's screams, never once stopping for a single breath of air. The Gatling gun imperfectly chucking the baseballs onto his limp body, crushing bones and organs alike in their malice. There was no doubt that a digital gadget could break under that amount of force as well.

I found it difficult to scour words. When I spoke, the words in my mouth felt heavy and sour, still fresh of death. "You're... right. It wouldn't be surprising for the handbook to break during that kind of assault."

"Hey, hey!" It was the assaulter himself, Monokuma, rounding the corner of the corridor and into the main hall. At this point, his sudden appearances felt like the norm, and my heart rate only quickened a little from his voice. "Heyheyheyheyheyheyhey!"

There was a definite wrath to his tone, like I had just insulted his entire bloodline by saying what I said. His tiny silver claws extended from a paw, and he held it close to his face as a threat of violence. "That e-handbook is essential to student life here! Crucial, integral, instrumental, a super big deal!" He snarled, eyes flashing red rage. "There's no way it would break that easily!"

"But it did." I rebutted, holding up the handbook for show. A groan escaped Monokuma, as if he were starting to run low of patience dealing with me.

"If I say it wouldn't break, it wouldn't freakin' break!" He snapped. "It can withstand up to ten tons of pressure, and it's waterproof up to a hundred meters, okay? I don't care how many baseballs you hit it with, it won't do crap!"

"It has to have a weak point, right?" Byakuya cut in with arms crossed over his chest and a glare to match. "Otherwise, this one wouldn't have broke, right?"

All of a sudden, Monokuma's spirits and morals sunk into depression. His eyes averted to the ground, shameful. "I guess you're right. Even my amazing handbook does have one single weak point."

"It does?" My voice was overspilling with surprise as I exclaimed my words.

Monokuma leaned in forward like a child and shushed me. "But it's a secret! I wouldn't want you to go breaking any more handbooks!"

"Then Leon must have broken it somehow without realizing what its weakness was, right?" Byakuya continued to interrogate the bear for answers of our mystery. At this, Monokuma rocked back onto the balls of his feet and pondered with a hum.

"Hmm..." He pretended to wonder. "Hard to say! You know what I think? I think his handbook isn't actually broken!"

My eyes widened at his statement and immediately gazed down to spot Leon's handbook. Without a doubt, it was broken. "Wh-How?"

Monokuma snickered into his hands at my question. "You're smart, right, right? You'll figure it out, right, right?"

Without any elaboration on his odd words, Monokuma waddled out from the main hall, his tiny, soft footsteps fading away as he padded further from our sight. Of course he didn't let us in on the details. To say the least, I was disappointed, but not too surprised. I sighed deeply, reaching out an arm to set down the handbooks back into the mailbox.

"Well, I don't really see a relevance to what he just said," retorted Byakuya, shaking his head. "I guess we can move on to the next part of our investigation. We need to reveal the identity of Chihiro's killer."

"Yeah," I felt myself murmur, hands beginning to tremble from my sides. "We have to...avenge her. And find her killer."

There was a brief moment of uncomfortable silence before he abruptly turned to me to ask, "Who do you think the killer is?"

I was caught off guard once again. Blinking out of sheer confusion, I replied with, "Um, I'm not actually sure, really."

He gave me an unimpressed stare at my lack of a answer. "You really must be lacking a brain because it's rather quite obvious."

"Obvious...?" I echoed, furrowing my eyebrows as I tried to reach to the back of my memories. It was far too early to begin listing off specific suspects, but there _was_ one exception. My eyes broadened in sudden realization. "Do you mean...Genocider Syo's the one that killed Chihiro?"

"Absolutely." replied Byakuya, short and curt, like the solution was clear all along. "I have no doubt that Genocider Syo is the culprit in this case."

"How can you be so sure?" His confidence was almost surprising at how much egotism it held. Sure, there were evident clues that pointed to Syo, but for all we know, this may be just a copycat crime. I wasn't sold on the idea that a media-popular murderous fiend had been lurking inside our school this whole time; it sounded so abnormal, yet so petrifying.

"There's nobody else it could be," Byakuya retaliated with a slight roll of his eyes. "A murderous fiend, who kills again and again using a bizarre and brutal method. They're like a ghost, attacking suddenly then slipping away before the police can catch up to them." He glared straight into my eyes, burning holes in my gaze and self esteem. "And what nickname did the Internet give to this mysterious serial killer?"

"Genocider Syo..." I heard myself barely rasp as an answer. I couldn't even believe it, or rather, I didn't want to. Was someone like that really prowling among us students? "They say they've killed thousands of people." A frown accompanied my hesitant words. "But that's gotta be an urban legend. Could one of us really be a demented, psychotic killer like that?"

Byakuya chuckled at my monologue of ponder. "You're not wrong to wonder," he remarked, a lopsided smile replacing the grimace on his face. "I have something that will prove it. And I can show you."

"Prove it...?" My breath got knocked out from my sore lungs. "Wait, so you have evidence that one of us is a psychotic killer?"

"There's somewhere I'd like to take you," he began to walk away from his position, turning his back onto me. "This will provide all the evidence you need to figure out that Genocider Syo is the one that killed Chihiro."

Was there really such a thing? Questions began to litter my mind until my head was cluttered with endless thoughts. How could a serial killer, famous all over the world through media, be one of us, a high school Ultimate? Nobody here even gave the slightest vibe that they were a born murderer. It was impossible.

But apparently, Byakuya heavily disagreed with my skepticism. Without waiting for me to object, or even respond, he began to pace away in a haste more hurried than ever. He was tall, much taller than I, so it took a tremendous effort from me to catch up. He didn't even inform me of our destination, leaving me in a cloud of dust that only made me worry further. Did he really have any evidence that pointed to Genocider Syo?

I trailed after a brisk Byakuya through the entangled halls of the first floor, and back up to the second. The air was freezing against my skin as I trudged after him, making me shiver on instinct. Murderous fiends on the loose, another dead classmate, an approaching Class Trial, and a promised execution. Today would certainly go down in history.

When Byakuya finally halted his steps inside of the pink hallway on the second floor, I was puzzled. Peering over his shoulder, I spotted the double oak doors of the library, sitting just a few steps away from us.

"The...library?" I forced out, swallowing a lump of discomfort down my throat. I immediately got chills.

"Come on," he reached out a hand to tightly grip the golden handle of the twin doors. "Let's go in."

At his own command, Byakuya yanked the door open, causing the hinges to squeak and groan. He held the door open for only a second before ducking into the library on his own, and I rushed over to slip inside in time. The door slammed to a cacophonous shut behind my back, and I flinched from such a loud sound.

I've only been to the library four times before, not nearly as many as Byakuya did, but everything still looked identical to when I had last visited. The books were neatly arranged by alphabetical order, the chairs were pushed into the crooks of the table, and the lighting remained dim. Squinting my eyes, I glanced briefly around the room, trying to regain familiarity with the library. The bookshelves were dusty yet pristine, the pillars straight, and the tables clear. But when my gaze flickered down towards the floor, I noticed something off about the table in the center of the room.

On top of the desk, was the lamp Byakuya frequently used to read his novels during his free time. However, the bulb was dead, dark, devoid of any remnants of light. That could only be because the plug and cord to the lamp were missing.

I narrowed my eyes in the dim darkness. I could have sworn I had just seen it present the day before, when I came here with Toko. Why, and how did it disappear?

Then I remembered the ivory extension cord tied around Chihiro's wrists, binding her into a suspension.

I put two and two together with a dismantled train of thoughts. Was the missing lamp cord the same one used to tie up Chihiro's dead body? 

I couldn't be certain of my conjecture, but it definitely got my mind rolling into another pile of theories. Somebody most likely came to the library, stole the extension cord, and brought it back to the crime scene, where they used it to suspend Chihiro's corpse in the girls locker room. That part was clear enough in my head, but the why and the who were still murky. I shook my head vigorously to clean the slate that was my consciousness, deciding that I should solely focus on the present for now. I had time to figure things out during the trial.

"Um," I awkwardly began, my voice cracking alongside our shared quietude. "Is the evidence that proves it was Genocider Syo really in the library?"

Byakuya snorted at my attempt of a conversation starter. "Don't make me say it again. Go check out the archive if you're so curious about it." Using a finger, he pointed to the maple door nestled in the back of the library. My eyes flitted towards the depths of the room, and traced the outline of the entrance carefully.

Moving carefully, I brushed past long wooden tables and solid chairs, occasionally bumping into a hardened edge with a silent curse resting on my lips. I cautiously stepped over to the archive door, and rested my hand on top of the handle. It took a lot more force than I had anticipated to pry the door open, and when I did, an overwhelming cloud of dust was released.

I coughed out of reflex, waving away the debris with a flap of my hand. Byakuya, who was standing a few feet behind me, shouldered past my hunched figure and into the pitch inkiness of the library archive.

The overhead lights of the archive room were poor to say the least. It seemed as if they hadn't been used in a long while, barely flickering alive when Byakuya turned on the switch. The lighting was dim, and the rest of the room was shrouded in a blanket of night and mystery. I left the door open behind me just in case of anything.

The archive itself was a small, cramped room; the filmy, mud colored tiled floor was cluttered with dusty cardboard boxes, wrinkled old papers, and discarded books rotting with age. The interior walls were completely lined up with bookshelves, housing many files and records of anything you could dream of. The air felt stale inside my lungs, and it was coated in a fine lining of grime. I coughed once again.

"There's so much dust in here." I barely choked out between gasping coughs of air. Byakuya smirked in midst of the darkness, the weak light scarcely reflecting off his glasses frames.

"I would say there's enough value in this place to endure the dust." He gestured to all of the documents jammed onto the measly shelves. Through one squinted eye, I followed his hand move from one case to the other.

"There's so many files stuffed onto the shelf," I pointed out, directing my pointer finger to the bookcase to my far right. "What's in all these things?"

Immediately, Byakuya's mood soured at my sudden interest. He let out a scoff of mock irritation. "You don't want to look inside those reports. For commoners like you, they're far too treacherous. They hold dangerous truths for authority eyes only."

"Dangerous truths, huh?" I repeated, my voice uneasy with anxiety.

"These things are filled with graphic, disturbing photos from all kinds of crime scenes." elaborated Byakuya. "It's the kind of thing any normal person wouldn't ever want to look at. Be careful."

Be careful? "What does that mean?" I inquired, my fingers finding their way to nervously play with the rubber bands clinging to my wrists. 

Byakuya's eyes pierced through my entire soul with just one menacing look. "All those files there are investigation reports related to different cold cases. Those are internal documents, for police eyes only. They're not the kind of thing you'd expect to leak."

"Oh." Was all I had to say. The mere thought of something so gruesome, and so confidential, sent my stomach tossing and turning with discontent. Suddenly, I felt as if I were intruding into something truly private, and a knot of unsettlement grew inside my chest. Byakuya chuckled again at my silence.

"So?" He waved an arm to gesture to the entirety of the archive. "Are you finally beginning to understand the true splendor of this library? _This_ room was the sole reason why I was so interested in the library. It's home to classified government documents, police records, things no ordinary person would ever see." He turned to meet me in the eye, and I could see an inhuman shadow of sociopathy glitter in his gaze. "Isn't it magnificent?"

My throat was dry when I parted my lips to speak. "This...can't be for real, right?"

Again, he scoffed and crossed his arms in revulsion. "That's one of your fatal flaws. You conclude something is false simply because it doesn't feel real to you."

"Well," I paused, trying to fish for the right words to put out. "I-It's not like I totally refuse to believe it, but," I swallowed my sentences, shaking my head as I tried to reconstruct a new one. "I mean, there's just so _much._ How could anyone have put all of this together?"

"You certainly talk a lot for a useless commoner," he insulted, turned his back to skim the files tucked tightly into the shelves. "But I do assure you. These are real."

I stared in disbelief as he continued to flip through the documents. "H-Hold on a second! How do you know these are real?"

"The documents gathered here are genuine." He said from his position. I could not see his face from where I was standing, but I knew his tone displayed truth. "I have reviewed them multiple times, so there is no doubt."

"But..." My head whipped from side to side to look at all of the jammed packed reports. "All this has tp be like, top secret, confidential stuff, right? So why...?"

He gave me an answer right away, not even hesitating for me to continue my question. "My family has a reading room just like this at our home. Ours is bigger, of course. And not as dusty."

My breath got caught in my throat as I tried to force out words. "Huh?"

"Members of the Togami family have access to any variety of government-related documents," he resumed to elaborate, not turning back once to look at me. It seemed as if he were looking for something, a file, perhaps? "So whenever I have time, I like to review whatever documents and materials that interest me. Which is why I can proclaim, without a doubt, that the materials gathered here are the real thing."

Checking out and reading confidential government cases just to kill time. That sounded like something either a detective or a psychopath would do. Indeed, Byakuya was beginning to terrify me more than even the mastermind.

"And what always interested me the most were the "cold case" police investigation reports," As he spoke, he pried a single thick, inky file from its home on the shelf. "And among all those reports, one of my recent favorites is the Genocider Syo case." Finally, he turned his back around to stare at me straight in the eye, like a predator narrowing down on prey. He held up the document in his hand. "This is the complete case file."

"The...Genocider Syo case file?" I gaped at the black coated document; the only decorative points was the bland title of the case, printed in thin, white letters, "Murder Cases of Genocider Syo", and beneath it, "TOP SECRET".

"Every single report surrounding the Genocider Syo cases has been compiled in here." He tapped against the hardcover of the file twice with his nails. "Because there are so many, allow me to quickly summarize the main points.

"To begin, there are two notable characteristics in every Genocider Syo murder. The first characteristic is that at every crime scene, the word "bloodlust" is written in the victim's own blood. And the second, is that when the victims are murdered, their bodies are suspended in a certain way."

Those two characteristics that Byakuya mentioned rung a bell of familiarity inside my ears. Having the grisly message of "bloodlust" painted onto the wall, having the corpses suspended from the ground, all sounded too familiar to me. Because, I had seen it with my very two eyes.

Chihiro, murdered and strung up into suspension by her wrists, with the word "bloodlust" written with her own blood. Without a doubt, her death matched the appearances of the Genocider Syo murders.

Byakuya must've seen my face contort with bewilderment, as he chuckled and added, "Save your surprise. The best part is yet to come. For the second characteristic, where the victims are suspended, the only ones who knew about that particular fact were members of the police and other higher-ups." He gave me a look of amusement, as if challenging me to piece together his puzzle. "By all accounts, nobody in the media ever found out."

Again, I was hit with another wave of disbelief, one after the other. I blinked. "Huh?"

"In other words," he turned the file around in his hands. "No one on the news, no one online, _nobody_ knew about that aspect of each crime. Only key officials and the killer themself knew about this act of "mounting" the victim. And if you recall Chihiro's corpse, her body was most certainly mounted in this fashion."

I watched soundlessly as he tossed the case from one palm to the other, as if it were nothing but a mere book. "So...how could the killer have known about suspending the victim?"

"That's the key question." His smile, in the darkness of the archive, seemed more like a twisted grin than anything welcoming. "But in fact, the answer is quite simple. The culprit isn't a copycat killer. It's the real Genocider Syo."

I made some choked noise in shock at his sheer confidence. He really did have proof that supported his theory after all, and I couldn't believe even one ounce of it. Genocider Syo was really one of us?

"That right there is the evidence that Genocider Syo has hidden themself among the rest of us." Byakuya said, still smirking at his superior knowledge. He nodded, seemingly to himself. "Things are really starting to get interesting, aren't they? I never imagined a killer with such a reputation would ever become part of our little game."

A brutal, fiendish serial killer was a high school student? And not only that, they were my classmate? It was something straight from a thriller novel, simply unbelievable. That thought terrified me until every hair on my body rose in pure horror. I shivered, even though the archive itself was rather warm.

I wasn't contributing much to this conversation, so once again, Byakuya picked it up. "Now, don't you think it would be good for you to take a look at what I've already seen?" 

He outstretched an arm to hold the file out to me. I stared at it for a brief moment, unsure of whether to take it or not. It certainly would have gruesome scenes unerasable to the human mind. Bloody murders, lifeless corpses, I wasn't ready to see any more after the deaths of my classmates. But then again, it could hold a clue or two helpful in narrowing out who Chihiro's killer was.

With that thought in mind, I reluctantly reached out to accept the case.

It was solid and quite heavy in my hands. I gripped the document tightly in my hold, until my knuckles turned white with force. Then, using hesitant, trembling, tense fingers, I began to slowly open up the file.

Page after page of police reports, jotted down in a handwriting far too sophisticated for me to read. I didn't try to anyway. I was afraid of what horrendous details awaited among those words. I kept flipping the turning the thin pages, until I reached one where photos rather than sentences were seen.

I froze.

There, were photographs, real life photographs, of murder scenes.

I almost screamed, but managed to force myself into stillness.

For several pages, names, descriptions, and pictures of Genocider Syo's victims were depicted. It felt like an endless list of sufferers, and I started to believe the urban legend claiming they've massacred thousands. All male, their ages varied in numbers, from thirty two, to even fourteen. They were each killed and suspended in the exact same way.

Scissors used to stab and murder the victim, were also aided in attaching them to the wall in a crucifix position. And there was always, always a message screaming "bloodlust" accompanying the victim's body in blood. The style of the murders were almost identical to Chihiro's.

But, I thought with a furrowed frown. Not exactly. Chihiro's cause of death was different, and what was used to suspend her was odd as well. Perhaps Syo didn't have their scissors on them at the school? That would make sense, considering our confiscated belongings from the first day of school.

Byakuya read along from his position a few steps away. I could hear the smirk in his voice as he said, "Now take a look at the next page, and you'll find another interesting tidbit."

My fingers reached to the corner of the page and flipped it around to the next. Printed in bold letters, the heading read, "Profiling Results".

My eyes skimmed over the summary of the results, lips murmuring the words out loud. "All of the crimes took place either on weekdays at night, or during holidays, either day or night. The most common time for the killings to take place was on holidays, in the afternoon. Based on these facts, it could be suggested that the suspect may be a student...?" My voice died at the end, but I commanded myself to carry on, despite my distress.

"Evidence suggests that the suspect lingered at the scene, but when they did leave, they were in a panic. Because an eyewitness has never come forward, it's unlikely that there was any external reason for this. This confused behavior suggests that the suspect may potentially suffer from dissociative identity disorder." My head snapped up to look at Byakuya, who appeared deep in thought.

"The key point is that the culprit may well have a split personality," he explained, gesturing to the heavy file in my hands. "That's why the suspect left so quickly from their own crime."

"A split personality?" I felt myself go completely and utterly numb. Yet again, it was something straight from a television drama. Just how many stereotypes and horror genres was I living in? A killing game with kidnapped students, trials resulting in death, a classmate serial killer, and a split personality to go along with it? It was too much.

"That, I believe," Byakuya gave me a flat and deathly look. "Is the crucial part in finding out Syo's identity."

Before I could even comprehend what he even said, urgent and frantic footsteps rushed towards the open door of the archive. Immediately, I whipped around to face the owner, file still clutched tightly in my hands. 

"Ah! Hey you two!" It was Aoi, her blue eyes wide with raw concern. "Big trouble! Need your help!"

"We're busy." snapped Byakuya, crossing his arms. He looked quite offended by her storming into our investigation. "Leave us alone."

"But it's an emergency! Emergency!" Aoi pleaded, pacing and jumping on her toes. She looked wholly anxious, worried, and I was afraid that she had discovered another body. "C'mon, please! You gotta help me!"

"Aoi, what's wrong?" I set down the case file onto one of the many overturned cardboard boxes so I could be prepared to sprint out of here. "What happened?"

"Something's wrong with Toko! She's acting super strange!" exclaimed Aoi. I recalled our moments earlier, inside the locker room, when Toko randomly fainted and arose as a different person. It wasn't too surprising for Aoi to say she was acting odd.

I glanced behind my shoulder to look at Byakuya. "What should we do?"

He hummed in ponder, adjusting the glasses on his nose. "Since it's Toko, I must admit. I'm intrigued. I suppose we can take a second to see what's going on with her."

I had expected him to decline, but much to my surprise, he accepted the offer. I thought for sure that he was going to say no, since it was regarding Toko, but strangely enough, he sounded almost curious. Just how many of my classmates were going to change personas today?

"Okay, okay, come on!" Aoi began to dash from the archive's doorway. "Hurry!"

"W-Wait, Aoi!" I called after her, panicking on my own. "Where are you going?"

"It looks like she's headed to the dorms. To Toko's room, most likely." added Byakuya, watching as the shorter girl ran away in haste. I swallowed, shifting on my feet.

"T-Then let's go!" I tried to follow Aoi out of the library, but her pace was much faster than mine. I could barely even catch sight of her long, bobbing ponytail as she dashed down the halls of the second floor, skipped the steps to the first, and led the both of us all the way to the dorms. By then, I was already out of breath, and nearly tripped three times over my own feet.

"You guys are too slow!" She complained, bouncing on the balls of her feet in anticipation and frustration. I took a moment to find my breath again.

"I think you're just..." I coughed into a fist. "Too fast..."

Even after running down an entire floor, Byakuya was in the perfect condition to speak without issue. He turned to Aoi, arms crossed, and questioned, "So? What's this emergency?"

Aoi explained her answer as she brought us to the front of Toko's dorm room. I could observe her nameplate, adorned with a neat print of her name and a cartoony pixilated figure of herself. "Well, after what happened in the girls locker room, we left Toko in her room so she could lay down," began Aoi. "After a while, we came back to check on her. Y'know, see how she was doing. But when we did, she was acting really weird." Aoi's eyes grew weary as she stared at the face of Toko's door. "She refused to come out, and she kept saying all this weird stuff."

"Weird stuff?" I echoed, still wheezing for breath. If I had to admit, she was acting peculiar earlier today; she was speaking in an entirely different manner, stutter gone and everything. She had been so nonchalant when seeing Chihiro's corpse, completely different from the hemophobic Toko I knew.

"We should try talking to her ourselves." Byakuya objected, shooting a challenging stare of ice towards me. "Go ahead, Junko. Go talk to her."

I was about to argue that, if he wanted to talk to her so badly, he could just do so himself, but I knew for better reasons that I should volunteer. With a sigh escaping my lips, I pushed past Byakuya and Aoi to reach the crimson door. Using my knuckles, I leaned in and rapped against the wood surface three times.

When the door didn't immediately open on command, I pondered whether or not I should call out and get her attention. I gave the surface one more knock for good measure, and parted my lips in order to yell out to her. But before I could even inhale a breath, the hinges of Toko's door leisurely creaked open.

The hatch was parted the slightest bit, revealing only a sliver of Toko's frightened, reluctant face. But that little sliver was enough to engulf me in a suffocating sea of pessimism and gloom. I could only see one eye, but I could tell that she was anxious, and frankly a bit irritated at my presence. 

"What?" She wasn't the most welcoming, either.

"Oh, um, nothing." I made a poor excuse for words. "It's just that...Aoi was really worried about you, holing yourself up in your room."

She made some sort of strangled noise of refutation. "Leave me a-alone."

"Could you open up, like, just a little?" I backed up a step so that I wouldn't have to be stared down by Toko's trembling gaze. "We'll leave you alone right after."

At my request, she fell dead silent, and I was afraid that I had offended her somehow. Her face remained pressed up against the crack of her door, but she was suddenly wordless. When she finally spoke, raspy and slow, I could see her eyes glint with absolute fear. "Won't a-allow it..."

"Huh?" I blinked at her counter. 

"I w-won't let Genocider Syo have control!" She yelled, in a stronger, more determined voice this time, and slammed the door in my face. An echo rung out from the impact and into my unbelieving ears.

I gaped at the shut door, trying desperately to comprehend what was said. What did she mean about Genocider Syo? What did she even say? "W-What was that?"

Aoi sighed with a concerned shake of her head. "She's been acting like that the whole time. When I rang a little while ago, she said something about "driving out the murderous fiend". It doesn't make any sense, right? She even barricaded her own door, and I couldn't bust in to talk to her."

She barred her own door too? I narrowed my eyes in thought. Perhaps, was she scared of the potential serial killer roaming school grounds? Was she trying to hide from Chihiro's killer? "Isn't there anyone who might be able to persuade her?" I asked.

"You know," Aoi abruptly turned around, her hair whipping against her cheek with such vigor. "Byakuya, you're the only one who hasn't tried yet, right? How 'bout you go talk to her?"

Again, I expected him to decline such an offer, but much to my surprise, he replied with a short, "Fine, whatever." His sudden contribution brought me into a state of shock as I watched him shoulder beside us and ring the doorbell to Toko's room. There was a few seconds of silence, before, yet again, Toko pried open her door and glimpsed out from the crack.

"Leave me alone!" She snapped with growing annoyance. "You're all s-s-so annoying..." From my position, I saw her eyes slowly flicker to gaze at the figure in front of her, and widen with realization of who it was. "Ah! B-Backula!"

"It's Byakuya." He sighed.

"I-I'm sorry." She began to apologize all of a sudden, catching me off guard once more. "I couldn't k-keep our promise."

Promise?

"But don't w-worry," she swallowed for a breathy gasp of air between her frantic words. "Never again. I-I won't let Genocider Syo have control ever again!"

And the door slammed shut.

"H-Hey! Toko!" Aoi lunged forward to grasp the silver door handle. She pounded a fist against the door and began to call. "What are you talking about? Come on, you gotta explain!"

I was more focused on the promise part she made with Byakuya. Never have I ever seen him step six feet apart from Toko, much less make a promise with her. What were they even discussing? And when?

Too many questions, too little time to ponder. I let an exhale of exasperation escape my lungs as I watched Aoi try to shake the door open.

"What the hell is going on?" I heard myself mumble without a reply. My gaze lifted to peer at Byakuya, who had now made his way beside me to make room for Aoi. From the corner of my eye, I thought I saw him smile in satisfaction.

My question was left unanswered, hanging in the air like the scent of death after a murder. There were just too many mysteries bundled inside this game, and no matter how many times I ask, "What is going on", I could never get a direct response. This school was built on a foundation of truths and lies, mysteries and answers, all tucked away where I couldn't find them. All I could possibly do now is try.

Try to solve Chihiro's unjustly murder.

Try to survive through the trial.

Try to last those four melody notes that signaled through the thick, tense air.

Four chimes, like a school bell. 

The monitor at the far end of the dorm halls buzzed and hummed with fuzzy static, then fell dead in silence. Monokuma's face flickered on screen, grinning viciously towards the camera. The wine in his hands were the color of blood. Chihiro's blood.

"Erm, so ah, I'm getting tired of waiting," he pronounced, as if he were waiting for a circus ride rather than a trial of life and death. I felt my fingers, all five, clutch into a tight fist as I glared at the wilted screen overhead. "Shall we just plunge right in?

"It's the moment you've all been waiting for: the Class Trial!"

Much against my wishes and hopes, another class trial has just begun. Another petrifying murder, another horrifying execution. Deception, hurt, death. More betrayals and lies, loss and accusations, and most of all, despair. That was what the class trial was all about.

"You remember where to meet, right?" Monokuma leaned in closer to the screen, his jagged red eye uncomfortably near. "Please go through the red door on the first floor of the school!" He giggled insanely, excited, almost. "See you soon!"

The monitor cut to pitch black, and any lingering noise died alongside the light.

"You heard him, right?" Byakuya did not even hesitate a second to let his words truly sink in. His words were meant for the both of us, but his eyes were trained on me, as if he were asking me a most important question. "We better hurry to the elevator before the trial begins without us."

Aoi's eyes flickered to glance at Toko's door, still shut close and unbudging. "But...what about Toko?"

Turning his back on her, Byakuya replied with, "Just try and get her out. She's an important part to this case this time."

I did not know what he meant by that, yet I didn't bother to question. Byakuya was holding in too many secrets of his own, secrets that I could only hope be revealed in the Class Trial. His promise with Toko, his strange behavior, it all felt so foreign to me. Unlike everybody else, who was petrified at the mere mention of another trial, Byakuya seemed amused. Excited. Pleased. He was treating it all as a game.

And so, without much of a protest, Byakuya and I reluctantly left Aoi behind and began to head towards the direction of the red door. Not a single sound of acknowledgement was exchanged between the two of us. Instead, our footsteps filled in the chilling gaps of silence, mine heavy, his brisk. I was dreading the trial, he was eager. 

Indeed, he scared me.

We pushed past many intertwining halls and corridors in order to locate the magenta hallway where the red door laid at the very end of it. My steps were hesitant as I swallowed a lump of pure anxiety down my throat, afraid of what's to come. Who was the killer this time? Who will die next? Each ponder I had tormented my sanity into bits and pieces.

"Come on." Byakuya started ahead of me, reaching out a hand to yank the door open. It swung at his command, and he stared back at me a few feet away from the entrance. "Let's go already."

With a doubtful, nervous nod, I stepped forward and caught the door as it was closing behind Byakuya. I stared at my trembly hand, gripping against the wooden frame, and for a split second, contemplated on going inside. I knew that the minute I entered, I would be signing a death warrant of despair. But I must do this, no matter the stakes. It was all for Chihiro.

Sweet Chihiro. The death of a person as kindhearted, as tender, as beautiful as her needed to be avenged. She was my friend, after all.

And so, I slipped past the red door.

Once again, the same dull, cramped room greeted my weary eyes. Limestone walls, textured floors, and round ceiling lights gave an uneasy feel to the entire room. And the rusty, dark elevator resting across from me wasn't the most welcoming either. In fact, I felt goosebumps race up my arm as soon as I stepped inside.

It appeared that almost everyone was present. And by that, everyone except for Aoi and Toko, who presumably were still in the dorms. I closed the door behind me.

"Hey, where's Toko and Aoi?" brought forth Mondo, eyes glancing and scaling up everyone in the room. A jumbled mess of murmurs and mumbles claiming their lack of knowledge echoed in the air. Shoulders were shrugged, heads were shaken, hands were fidgety. The energy inside here was most definitely anxious.

"Well," I tried to explain. "Toko's refusing to come out of her room, and Aoi is trying to get her to come out."

More whispers. More grumbles of trepidation.

"Wait, what happens if they don't attend the trial?" Yasuhiro inquired with a terrified tone paired with wide eyes.

Celeste tugged at a loose seam in her complex, black gothic dress. "Punishment, perhaps? Mandatory presence at a class trial is now one of the school regulations, no? After what Makoto had done?"

I felt my blood freeze into splinters of ice. She was right; if they didn't come to attend the Class Trial, then would they be punished, just like Makoto? The air suddenly grew colder, and I shivered out of pure fear. I didn't want any more blood to be spilt, and I abruptly felt guilty for not trying harder to persuade Toko to come out. What if she was now hurt?

With I was busying myself in an ocean of my own worries, I heard faint yelling and protesting beyond the closed door. My head snapped up and I whipped around to stare at the frame, my heart rate quickening with anticipation. My anxiety shot through the roof when the red door in front of me burst open with immense vigor.

It was Monokuma, dragging in a screeching Toko behind him, with a concerned yet angry Aoi trailing after his steps. With a rather proud look upon his face, Monokuma let go of the back of Toko's collar with a huff, crossing his arms. The aforementioned quickly scrambled to her knees in a panic, stumbling as she arose.

Toko quivered alongside her words when she began to speak, "I t-told him I didn't want to but..." she swallowed and shot a wavering glare at the bear, "h-he forced me! I can't believe you would d-drag a girl around..."

Aoi, now standing beside Toko, shook her head disappointedly at Monokuma, crossing her arms in vexation. "Terrible. You're terrible."

"Whew!" cheered Monokuma, puffing up his chest. He completely ignored the other two's protests. "So _now_ everyone's here, right? Okay then, hustle onto the elevator and lets get this show on the road!" He drifted towards the door, cracking it open so he could slip outside. He waved gleefully back at us, which nobody reciprocated. "See you down there!"

He disappeared with a moderate click of the red door. I gripped against the fabric of my miniskirt, mind conflicting and clashing with thoughts. At least he didn't punish Toko like he did with Makoto, but I still felt quite unrestful. If she was this willing to not attend, how strong was her connection to the murder? Was she a witness? The culprit? There was no good end.

"So, shall we get going?" Byakuya began to make his way toward the elevator, prompting a few others to shuffle hesitantly. "It's time to find out who killed Chihiro."

"We have no choice, right?" My voice was much weaker than intended when I replied. "We have to do this."

Kyoko nodded from beside me. "Let's go then. It's better we get this over now than later."

Her words of reply held some sort of reassurance, although I wasn't clear on why. However, despite this, the other students agreed, and one by one, everybody began to file into the elevator. I squeezed myself in between two people somehow, and carried myself on shaky legs inside.

Just as always, the elevator was dim, stuffy, yet absolutely freezing with horror. It sent my body in a repetitive state of panic that forced my breaths to intensify and my chest become tight. We were about to enter the trial grounds once again. We had lost yet another friend, and soon to be another. I couldn't handle it at all.

The nerves in my arms trembled to no end, and my breathing grew rapid as the elevator doors slid to a shut behind us. Then, slowly, it began to descend. 

The loud, obnoxious clanking noises of the steel box digging itself deeper into the ground only increased my stress. It took everything in me to hold back a scream of exasperation. The knot of unease and dread that had planted itself inside my body from the very first day of school grew larger and large, until I could feel nothing but pure fear running through my veins. I clenched my fists, but I was still shaking.

I needed to concentrate. What laid mere seconds in front of me was a situation so crucial, you could call it a game of life and death. Make one mistake, and you'll fall into the hands of perish. I needed to uncover the identity of Chihiro's killer, even if it meant sacrificing one of my friends. My heart suddenly dropped fifty stories. It was then I knew that another death was guaranteed today.

Somebody must die for us to survive.

As the elevator grew closer and closer to the courtroom, I tried to tame my hysteria and reminded myself to remain calm. My entire life was depending on my weak wit, and I had to try my hardest to unearth the truth. I inhaled sharply, hands shaking against my sides. I heard from somewhere that the key to a deep breath wasn't a big inhale, but rather, a powerful exhale. I let go of all the air inside my lungs until I could breathe no more.

By then, the doors were already opening to a world of despair.

This time, the trial grounds appeared slightly different from before. The navy walls were replaced with a gold and maroon checkered design that wrapped around the interior of the courtroom. The golden pillars and the ruby curtains still stood, but the floor beneath our feet was now a complex pattern of red and white tiles. How Monokuma managed to redesign the whole room in such a short amount of time, I didn't know. 

My eyes fluttered and blinked as I stepped out of the elevator, still adjusting to the light. I didn't even notice when Monokuma himself suddenly appeared from his throne, scrambling to seat himself properly. When he cleared his throat, I finally peeled my eyes away from the room and gazed at the robotic bear.

"What do you think?" He pranced and wiggled inside his chair out of excitement, like a child. "I redecorated! Isn't it so fresh? Isn't it so EXCITING?"

Byakuya had no time to discuss interior design with two feet tall bears. He scoffed, shooting a piercing glare straight through Monokuma's beady eyes, and snapped, "Don't waste our time with stupid questions. Let's get this over with."

"Good, good, you're getting excited!" Monokuma sighed with content. "Okay then, let's get this show on the road! Everyone, please find your assigned seats!"

He almost sounded like a teacher commanding his students to file to their permanent seats in class. And we, the pupils, obliged and dispersed across the room to scour for our respective stands. It didn't take me very long to reach my own, and I stood behind my own wooden podium. Gripping the rough sides of the stand, my eyes flickered and danced around the circle of desks to count everyone there. Suddenly, our class felt a lot smaller with four people gone.

On the floor just in front of me, I could see a single shard of broken glass lying on the ground, glinting beneath the golden glow of the fluorescent lights. Monokuma had forgotten to clean that up from the first trial. I assumed that eventually, the hunk of crystal lost its balance on my stand, and fell to the ground with a shatter. Shattered, just like our fragile hope.

Seeing that everyone was now seated at their own podiums, Monokuma began to open up the trial. "Let's begin with a basic explanation of the class trial! So, your votes will determine the results."

We had become quite familiar, perhaps a bit too familiar with the rules, but we all collectively let Monokuma to continue anyways.

"If you can figure out "whodunnit", then only they will receive punishment. But if you pick the wrong one," his voice was light and singsongy. "Then I'll punish everyone _besides_ the blackened, and the one that deceived everyone else will graduate!"

I couldn't seem to release my firm hold onto the edges of my wooden stand. There it was again, the painful reminder that somebody today, no matter what could possibly happen, is destined to die. And it was our duty to determine who it would be.

"Okay then," Monokuma cleared his throat as he adjusted his seat up in his throne. "So first off, let's talk about the murder weapon!"

Despite the hazy hurricane of mysteries that drowned this case out, there was one thing I was certain of: the murder weapon. The Monokuma File had stated that the weapon was a blunt object, and sure enough, at the scene of the crime, there was a blunt object. A dumbbell, discarded onto the floor, coated in blood. That was the only possibility there was.

"Chihiro's fatal injury," Sakura took the role to pick things up where Monokuma himself had left off. She crossed her arms as she began to recollect, "It appears it was a head wound."

That I could agree with. It was clear that Chihiro had died from a blow to the head. 

Kiyotaka spoke next in our debate. "According to the Monokuma File, the killer used a "blunt instrument", but," he furrowed his thick eyebrows. "What kind of "blunt instrument" could it have been?"

"I bet it was an iron pipe!" Yasuhiro suggested.

"No, I don't think it was an iron pipe," I refuted, trying to make my voice as steady as I could. "It's probably the dumbbell we found at the scene of the crime. It was covered in blood, and there was nothing else at the scene that could have caused that kind of injury."

Kyoko nodded in agreement at my statement. "And the wound on the victim's head is consistent with the shape of the dumbbell. As far as I'm concerned, there's no mistake and no room for doubt on this one."

"You looked at her head wound?" repeated Aoi with wide, disturbed eyes. I had to admit, it did sound rather horrifying to do so. 

"Kyaaaah!" Hifumi screamed in terror from my right, causing me to flinch at the sudden volume. "That's so creepy!"

Kyoko didn't respond to his childish cries and merely sighed with a shake of her head. Seeing a gap in the conversation, Byakuya decided to pitch in his own argument. "If you don't mind, I will proceed from here. Let's move on to discussion of the culprit." His menacing glare was risen to pierce through the eyes of everyone here. "Although, I believe the criminal behind this heinous act is already quite clear."

"What?" yelped Yasuhiro, clearly not expecting such an idea. "For real?"

As if talking on a monologue, Byakuya smirked with knowing and simply stated, "Chihiro's killer is the fiendish serial killer, Genocider Syo."

We had already discussed this beforehand, while looking through the high profile cases in the library archive. My fingers dug small crescent shaped dimples into the flesh of my wooden stand as I furrowed my eyebrows. There was plenty of proof to back Byakuya's theory up, but it just sounded far too surreal. Could Chihiro really could have been slain by Genocider Syo?

Yet, the more I thought about it, the more it didn't fit in place.

"What?" exclaimed Mondo, eyes broadening in sheer shock. "No fuckin' way!"

Smirk still on his lips, Byakuya continued to elaborate his hypothesis. "The culprit is Genocider Syo, I'm sure of it. Case closed, as far as I'm concerned."

"But that's impossible!" Aoi protested in denial. When she spotted how Byakuya's sharp gaze flickered to pin on her, her figure shrunk and wavered. "I mean...come on! There's just no proof for it!"

"Wait, wait," I tried to cut in before the debate could get even more heated than it already was. "I might know one way they could be involved."

Aoi's head snapped around to glance at me with absolute bewilderment on her face. "What?"

There was the document inside the library's archive, scripting off all of the details about every Genocider Syo killing. What was found in there heavily connected with Chihiro's murder, as I remembered. "Me and Byakuya found this file while we were looking around the archive of the library," I made the shape of a large, heavy, solid file with my hands. "It looked like some kind of confidential file the police put together about the Genocider Syo case."

"What?" said Mondo. "That's kinda weird as shit, isn't it? What was something like that doing in the library?"

"The why of it is probably more trouble than it's worth, so let's forget about that for now," Byakuya remarked as he pushed the frame of his glasses higher up his face. "More importantly, it outlines all the specifics of every Genocider Syo case in exceeding detail. According to the file, there appears to be two defining characteristics in every Genocider Syo case. The first is that a bloody message is found written at the scene of every murder."

"Oh, that's right!" Hifumi concurred in a tone three octaves lower than usual. "'Booblust"!"

"Uh, no," I didn't know whether to be disgusted or amused by his misconception. "It's actually "bloodlust"."

Ignoring the slight conflict on the side, Byakuya resumed on explaining the details. "But more important is the other characteristic. And it's something that has never been made public."

"Never made public?" Mondo blinked out of confusion, clearly lost in the discussion. "What the hell is it?"

Byakuya turned his head to face me. "Why don't you tell them, Junko?"

Now, it was my turn to be lost. "Huh? Me?"

"You've read the file too, right?" He pressed, giving me a challenging look to provoke. "So go ahead and say it. I can't be the only one carrying these trials."

I knew the answer very well; it was almost burned in my memory, seared into my brain. I recalled it with ease, despite my brief surprise on being called out. "Oh, well, apparently, in every Genocider Syo case, the killer suspends the body in a certain way. Other than the killer, the only people who know about this are the higher-ups in the police department."

"However," Byakuya took it off from there, and I let out a slight sigh of released tension. "Chihiro was most definitely suspended in the same way. So, how did the culprit know about this, when only high-level police officials are aware of it?" Everyone in the room, including Monokuma, listening with intent, was staring, waiting for Byakuya to answer his own question. "There's only one logical answer I can think of. It's because the culprit in this case, is the real Genocider Syo."

"No fuckin' way!" I heard Mondo exclaim from his seat.

From beside Byakuya, Celeste appeared quite shocked as well. "You're saying, Genocider Syo...is one of us?"

I had reached that conclusion a while ago, when I had begun to flip through the pages of the document. The odd times of the killings, the specific way Chihiro was killed, it all lead to one possible theory: Genocider Syo was a student, here with us, at Hope's Peak Academy. Which one of us is capable of doing such horrific crimes? I couldn't think of one possible suspect.

However, the name Byakuya uttered, was farthest from my list of potential killers.

"Yes. In fact, it's Toko."

Hearing her own name being called upon, Toko's wavering eyes widened out of pure horror. "Wh...?"

"Genocider Syo's true identity," Byakuya made sure to repeat himself this time. "Is Toko Fukawa."

To say the least, the courtroom was immediately set in shambles.

"YOU LIIIEEEEE!" Hifumi shrieked for the second time this day.

Toko quickly began to spiral into panic, her eyes trembling, her shoulders shaking, and her skin paling. "Wh-Wh-Wh-What?"

I couldn't help but feel speechless myself. How was Toko Fukawa, an extremely introverted, immensely hemophobic high school girl, an internet famous serial killer? She was the least of my worries. How was it that I had been living with a brutal murderer for almost a week, confined in our own school, so peacefully? How was it that I talked with her multiple times, even followed her to stalk Byakuya in the library, when she had a corpse count of a thousand? It couldn't possibly be true.

"Hey, okay, wait!" Aoi tried to argue back, but her voice sounded quite strained as well. "Hold on a sec! Toko has like, bloodphobia or whatever, remember? What kind of serial killer is afraid of blood?"

Byakuya merely crossed his arms in response, watching as the rest of the class began to freak and scare. "Is Toko Genocider Syo? The answer is yes...and no."

Yes and no? That sounded more like a riddle than it did an answer. I decided to try and decode this riddle on my own; if Toko is Genocider Syo, yet isn't at the same time, what did that mean? I drummed my fingernails against the rough surface of the wooden podium. Was something like that mentioned in the Genocider Syo file?

I attempted to think back to when I first read through it, and cleared out the notes regarding the suspects in my head. The police accounts hunched that the suspect in question suffered from Dissociative Identity Disorder, and may have two personalities sharing the same body. It was then I realized.

"Is it because Genocider Syo..." For a reason unknown, I winced, "has a split personality?"

"Huh?" Was a gasp originated from several students' gaping mouths.

"I think I read that somewhere in the file too," I back my reasoning up by returning to the talk of the document. "They thought that the suspect might have Dissociative Identity Disorder."

Hifumi was still set on believing that we were lying to the whole group. "O-Okay, but still, to go and say that about Miss Fukawa is-"

"Perfectly acceptable." countered Byakuya. "Toko's strange behavior after seeing the body is proof enough that she has a split personality. Think back- she fainted when she saw Chihiro's corpse, and then when she woke up, she was acting completely different from usual."

"She was acting funny, that's for sure!" concurred Kiyotaka with a pained look upon his face, as if it was physically hurting him to accuse his classmates of murder. "That melancholy tone of hers completely disappeared!"

"Not to mention," Byakuya added, not even hesitating once to let the rest of us breathe and take in the new, jarring information. "Once she regained consciousness and saw Chihiro's body again, she was utterly calm. In other words, within her is one personality that can't handle blood, and one that obviously can."

Toko, hearing all of these accusations and arguments, tried to protest against the allegations, but instead forced out a strangled, frightful noise from her throat. An ocean of mixed feelings swirled inside my body. Not only did Toko have a split personality, she shared the same body as a murderer? Everything became more and more confusing with each minute, and the trial had only just begun.

"So when Toko trapped herself in her room," Aoi began to piece this entire puzzle together with a slow nod of her head. "Was she trying to hide Genocider Syo?"

It seemed that Byakuya agreed wholly with her statement. "The reason she locked herself in her room wasn't to keep other people from getting in; it was to keep her other personality from getting out."

"What?" Yasuhiro cried out, clutching the sides of his head in distress. "No way!"

"Toko was afraid," Byakuya seemed far much more eager on this case than the last one. In fact, he almost seemed _too_ eager. It was borderline terrifying how adamant he was on declaring Toko the killer. "Afraid of the murderous fiend inside of her, of killing even more people."

Finally, Toko's incoherent rasps of a sentence became the slightest bit audible. "H-How...?" She whispered so hoarsely, I almost lost it in midst of all the voices, mingling in the air as murmurs.

"Yeah, how can you know all this?" demanded Aoi, clenching her fist in a determined fury to weed out the answer.

At this, Byakuya simply scoffed, almost amused at her commands. It was as if he knew far more than the rest of us, but refused to tell it out. "I do believe you misunderstood her. What she's trying to say isn't, "How can you know all this?'" The pristine surface of his glasses shone once beneath the blinding overhead lights of the hall. "No, what she wants to know is, "How could you tell them?'"

"Huh?" Aoi's stature wavered, suddenly put off guard as her hand lowered in surprise.

"Last night, just before Monokuma gave his "motive" speech," began Byakuya. "Toko and I had a strange conversation. She told me a most interesting story: she said a murderous fiend lived within her, and she was afraid it could appear and attack at any time." He had the audacity to even smirk at his own words. "And that trepidation is what's caused her to have such a bleak attitude. Isn't that right, Toko?"

Toko's breathing abruptly became heavy, heaving from her chest in large, hollow gasps. The look of pure betrayal, horror, and hurt was one I'd never forget, no matter how hard I tried.

Aoi's jaw dropped open at Byakuya's story. She jerked her head around to face Toko, who was still hyperventilating at her seat, eyes wide and voice gone. "This is all a lie! Right, Toko?"

Toko's hands slowly reached to grasp her head, and her arms trembled the hardest I'd ever seen. There were beads of sweat beginning to form on her face, her skin ashy. Her body shook intensely, as if every nerve in her system had been fried. When she tried to speak, her words were messy, jumbled, and almost disconnected. "Y-You said you wouldn't t-tell anyone!"

"What?" exclaimed Aoi, flinching at the abrupt confession. I, too, felt my body freeze and tense with raw, chilling terror. She had just admitted to having a split personality with a serial killer. The story was true.

I felt my heart plummet to my feet and shatter into a million pieces, just like the crystal ball that had once been resting on my podium. Shivers and goosebumps spread over my skin, and my breath hitched inside my throat. All of a sudden, my stomach grew a pit.

"You p-promised!" yelled Toko, her voice still shaking with heartbreak and pain. "I can't b-believe you l-lied!"

"You have only yourself to blame." Byakuya retorted, tone and eyes flat as he continued to degrade her. "You came to me with your tragic little story. I didn't ask you to."

The rest of the class was dead silent, not daring to make even the slightest sound. The only noise echoing in the vast interiority of the trial ground were the aching sobs of Toko, broken over treachery. I wanted to say something to at least hold some sort of comfort, but I could scavenge nothing in that cluttered brain of mine. So, I said nothing and instead bathed in guilt and despair.

"Besides," added Byakuya. "You broke your promise first. You said that as long as you were here, no matter what, you wouldn't let Genocider Syo kill anyone. But in spite of that promise, Chihiro still died in your hands. What ever happened to that promise of yours?"

Toko and Byakuya were now the only two conversing with one another in this class trial. "You said if I k-kept my promise, you would g-go out with me!" Toko's voice was exasperated, hurt beyond repair. "Th-That's the only r-reason I promised!"

At this, Byakuya seemed a bit more agitated, as he scowled instantaneously and proclaimed, "How many times do I have to tell you? I never said that. _You_ were the one who decided to tell me, and _you_ were the one who couldn't stop yourself from experiencing the thrill of killing. Am I right?"

"I-I tried!" This was the most distress I'd ever seen a single person showcase. Toko appeared ultimately, utterly terrified, of herself or Byakuya, I couldn't tell. Her voice cracked often and trembled with pent up emotion. "I swear I t-tried to control it! B-But, b-but-"

"But your efforts were useless." Byakuya finished her sentence billowing with desperation. "What a disappointment."

"I-I hate you." I heard Toko grit out between clenched teeth, seething in a mixture of both anger and misery. It was the worst kind of emotion one could ever hear.

Unaffected whatsoever, Byakuya continued to preach and lead the case. "Well, the opening act is nearly finished. All that's left is to hear from the person in question directly."

"The p-person?" Toko's voice was abruptly quiet, overshadowed by her fear. Her face grew extremely pale, to the point where it was a color so sickly, it could not match the shade of a human's skin. Her eyes grew slack and all signs of life escaped from her limp body. Without another word, she collapsed onto the cold, solid ground.

"T-Toko?" I jumped to my feet, startled, and most of all, concerned about her. Many others shared my reaction.

"Toko!" Aoi shouted, backing from her stand and covering her mouth with both hands.

"I-Is she alright?" questioned Kiyotaka, eyes widening in a quivering trepidation. It seemed as if everyone had their own way of worrying for her.

Well, quite luckily for us, Toko was perfectly fine.

She arose in the next second, slaughtering any words or voice remaining in the dead air. But when she straightened once again at her podium, she was no longer Toko.

Unblinking wide eyes, unnaturally wide pupils, and a slithering tongue creeping out of her mouth. There was no doubt on who she possibly could be.

The Ultimate Murderous Fiend.

Genocider Syo.

"Well hello there!" chirped Syo, wiggling her fingers beside her face in an open greeting. Immediately, chills raced up my spine at the mere sight of this woman. "Is it me you were hoping to see?"

From my right, Hifumi made some sort of strangled noise resembling shock in his throat, forcing out, "W-What the heck?"

In fact, the entire class exclaimed their own individual remarks of bewilderment, some vulgar, some frightened, others just surprised. Our horror stricken voices were mashed together to create a cacophony of cries and yells, echoing off the vast halls of the trial ground. I couldn't believe my eyes; it was Genocider Syo. The infamous killer of thousands, ever so popular amongst internet users, was standing just two seats away from me.

"So, you figure it out, huh?" Syo's voice was completely different from Toko's usual stutter. The way she spat out her words was a clear sign that she was not a sensible being. There was a fiery confidence and manic hidden in her tone as she spoke. "Well, whatever! What're you gonna do?"

"Y-You're-" I heard Aoi gasp, face paling with a sudden realization.

"That's right!" Syo trilled, striking a rather dramatic pose, as if on a stage. "I'm the Ultimate Murderous Fiend, Genocider Syo!"

Mondo backed up from his stand so suddenly, he almost knocked the wooden podium over. His eyes were wide. "What the fuck is this?"

"Toko," Kiyotaka looked both concerned and terrified at the same time, beads of sweat beginning to form on his forehead. "What happened to you?"

"Not Toko!" Syo groaned with a bitter irritancy. She spoke so fast, it was almost impossible to catch up with what she was saying. "That's a loser name! And what happened is a textbook split personality!"

Yasuhiro shivered audibly from his side of the room, watching behind frightful, broad eyes. "S-She's so...intense!"

"She's so different from the Toko we know." Even Sakura was startled by the abrupt appearance of Genocider Syo. The aforementioned crossed her arms sassily and nodded along so vigorously, it was confusing. 

"Just like how every inning has a top and a bottom," began Syo. I recognized those words: they were the same ones she'd sprouted after waking up in Toko's body this morning. "Or how in the depths of every truth lives a little lie..." Her piercing crimson eyes flashed blood behind her round framed glasses. "Behind every dark and gloomy soul lives another that shines as bright as the sun!"

To top her speech all off, she let out a howl of laughter so chilling, it could even rival Monokuma's.

It was instinctive that I shuddered. It was like seeing a bloody knife, or a loaded gun right in front of your eyes. Something lethal. Something deadly. The human body triggers a fight or flight reaction in response to the threat, prepping you to either run or fight. 

Hifumi tried to ask Syo one more question before finally succumbing to the horror her presence brought. "U-Um, Miss Syo? Can I ask you a question?"

Syo folded her hands together in front of her skirt and smiled cheerfully. "What's up?"

"Some of us think you might be the mastermind behind our entire situation." He admitted, bringing forth our conversation topic days ago. "What are your thoughts on that?"

"Well, I'll tell you!" Syo whooped, a wide, manic grin stretching upon her face. "I am the mastermind of all masterminds!"

Before I could pass out from even more shock, she added, "Just kidding!"

I didn't know whether to feel relieved or more scared by her answer. Was she even telling the truth? If so, who the hell is the real mastermind behind this game? I tried to swallow down all of my panic-inducing skepticism. "Then...it's not true?"

"Of course it's not true!" gloated Monokuma from his throne, just a few feet away from myself. He had just joined in our discussion as well. "How dare you try to link me to that creepazoid! I'm not even as half as cruel as this bloodthirsty maniac!"

I'd beg to differ, but I reasoned that it was not a time to press Monokuma's buttons for now. I left my array of insults inside my head.

"This should be enough to convince you," Byakuya announced, stopping Monokuma from going on a tangent yet again. He jabbed a finger directly towards Syo's seat, pointing straight at her. "This murderous fiend is responsible for Chihiro's death. There's clearly a motive, so there should be no doubt."

"A motive?" echoed Sakura, listening intently to the entire argument.

"Remember what Monokuma told us?" chided Byakuya, prodding our poor memories. "If someone didn't murder and graduate within twenty four hours, an embarrassing memory or secret would be revealed. Well, let's assume Toko's secret was about Genocider Syo." He raised his chin so he could stare all eleven of us down with a deathly glare. "If a secret like that came to light, Toko's life would have undoubtedly been forever ruined. So, she had a very clear motive to never have that side of herself exposed."

Again, Syo nodded her head energetically, a knowledgeable smile drawn on her lips. "Interesting. Very very very interesting!" Her back then straightened so fast, I was concerned about how it didn't break. Her pure red eyes glowered with both confidence and menace alike. "But sorry! As much as I hate to admit it, I'm not the culprit!"

"Huh?" Kiyotaka tensed.

Celeste shook her head deeply, visibly troubled by all the new twists and turns of events. "But I can't imagine anyone other than you could murder someone in such a bizarre fashion." She said.

"Maybe so, maybe so!" Syo seemingly agreed. "But nevertheless, it's the truth."

Sakura's arms were now crossed over her chest as she frowned down at the serial killer across from her. Her eyes were narrow with suspicion. "Do you really expect any of us to believe you?"

"Yeah!" Aoi shouted, fist clenching with red hot fury. Her voice echoed with stubbornness, "I could never believe a word you say, you monster!"

My eyes were trained onto the wooden front of my podium. I traced each loop and each splinter in the wood as I pondered Syo's words over and over again. Yes, she was quite unreliable; she literally killed people as a dear hobby of hers. But still, she claimed that she had been telling the truth. Was there any proof of her veracity?

I tried to think of evidence that supported Syo's innocence in relation to the crime. What was different from this case than the rest?

According to the document Byakuya showed me earlier, it noted down every last detail of Syo's murders. From the weapons, to the crucifixion, all the way down to the grisly message in blood, it all written down in record. Syo's weapon of choice were the scissors, and she'd used them to string up the deceased bodies of her victims. Yet, Chihiro, in contrast, was killed by a blow to the head, and hung with a lamp's extension cord. Suddenly, as if a light switched on in my brain, I understood.

"Perhaps if you had an alibi," Celeste chided, bringing a finger to her lips in thought. "That would change things."

"Ooh, an alibi, huh?" Syo's voice never once lost its ever-ending enthusiasm. It was terrifying to hear such a shrill yet chilling tone in a time so serious. "Now we're talkin'!"

With a rather annoyed sigh, Byakuya shook his head and uttered, "When you compare your past murders to this incident, the modus operandi matches completely."

"Are the methods of murder really exactly the same?" I doubted, trying to recollect all of my previous thoughts, scattered by my restless nerve. "There's a few obvious differences between the Genocider Syo cases and this one."

"Huh?" questioned Yasuhiro. "How's it any different?"

"Uh-oh! You don't know?" Syo taunted. She rested a single hand on her hip and, still grinning, exclaimed, "Well then, human garbage, let me tell you! I murder with passion and conviction! I consider myself a professional, and I have a very particular way of doing things! Imagine you go to a fancy Italian restaurant. They're very picky about the noodles, the sauce, everything.

"But what happened to Chihiro," continued Syo, varying her pitch and volume as she resumed to elaborate her strange ideology. "It'd be like if that same Italian restaurant started using Ragu or Chef Boyardee! This is no creation of mine!"

Somehow, even through her odd comparison between food and murder, I understood exactly what she was trying to prove. "Um," I began awkwardly, clearing my throat without success. "Let me rephrase that, in a way that maybe makes more sense. There are two clear differences between the Genocider Syo cases and this one. For one, the cause of death is different. In the Genocider Syo murders, all the victims were killed the same way. According to the case file, they were all apparently killed with a pair of scissors. But Chihiro died from a blow to the head, right?"

"Ah, yes!" proclaimed Hifumi from my right, nudging his small framed glasses higher on top the bridge of his nose. "That is remarkably different from the other murders!"

Just in case my point wasn't clear enough, I mentioned, "Wouldn't it be strange for someone who kills the same way without fail to suddenly change their method?"

"See?" Syo drew out the last syllable for longer than necessary. "Like I said! Italian restaurants don't make ramen!"

"That's...not what you said." muttered Aoi, shaking her head with crossed arms and a hefty sigh.

"Could you please stop comparing killing people to cooking?" Yasuhiro complained.

"And there's more." I attempted to steer the discussion back to our original topic. I reached up to grasp my chin with my fingers, shoveling farther and farther back into my hazy memories. "Do you remember what the killer used to suspend Chihiro? They used some kind of rope to hang her up by her wrists." I gestured both of my hands to mimic holding a rope of sorts. "But in all the previous Genocider Syo cases, something else was used to suspend them. Specifically, pairs of razor-sharp scissors."

At the mention of her dear weapon of choice, Syo grew even more ecstatic. She began to enthusiastically bounce up and down from her stand, and pointed her finger directly towards me. "Bingo!" She cheered. "And guess what! I used my own specially designed scissors for the murders _and_ the arrangement! Like I said, I'm a professional. So naturally, I'm very picky about the tools I use!"

Syo stopped her eager bounce to put her left hand on her hip once again. "And-andandandandand you know what else?" She trilled, mixing her words together in an incoherent, exhilarated blur. "Junk food said there's two differences, but she's wrong!"

"Junk food?" Now, that was a new one. I ultimately decided it was a bit more amusing than insulting. "Is that me?"

"Listen up, Junk food!" Syo raved, crossing her arms with a satisfied smirk. "There's actually one more difference! There's a pattern in all of my past victims, believe it or not! Figure that out, and you'll know exactly why I couldn't have killed that little loli girl!"

I was briefly surprised by the mention of another dissimilarity, but I tried to force my brain into thinking as soon as I recovered. There was a category that all her previous victims fell into, yet Chihiro didn't fit in. It took all of my patience to dig all the way back and recall the details of all of Syo's murder victims. The gory images of the unique crime scenes were terrifyingly vivid in my mind; I remember noting that all the sufferers were male, varying in different ages from fourteen to thirty two. 

"Is it because..." I wasn't so sure of my answer, as it was all based on conjectures of patterns, but I responded nonetheless. "Chihiro was a girl?"

Syo let out another giggling howl of laughter, clutching her stomach to prevent herself from doubling over. "Bingo! Bull's-eye! Right on the money!"

Yasuhiro gave his head a slight, exasperated shake of puzzlement. "What are you talking about?" He inquired.

"In all the Genocider Syo cases," I began to explain. "All the victims had something in common. They were all male."

"That's right!" sang Syo, clutching her reddening cheeks with both hands. "The people I kill with such passion and conviction are all adorable little men!" She guffawed once again; there was seemingly no end to her shrieks of laughter. "I can't believe I said it! I'm so embarrassed!"

Mondo flinched back, both startled and appalled by her unnatural gaiety. "The hell is wrong with you?"

"I can't help it!" Syo exclaimed, shaking her body from side to side out of sheer delirium. "I'm just a full-throttle boy-on-boy fangirl! And the mopey side of me just hates it! But now, I'm on the fast track to becoming a full-fledged fanmadam!"

At this confession, Kiyotaka was reasonably uncomfortable. "So since Chihiro was a girl, and not an," he made air quotes with his fingers, "'adorable little man", you wouldn't kill her?"

"Would an Italian chef suddenly start making ramen just because they're both noodles?" cried out Syo, as if she were almost offended by his reluctance. "Don't be stupid! I have too much passion and conviction to cross that line! That's the absolute reality of the one and only!"

Byakuya rolled his eyes from his side of the room. "We get it. You've clearly explained your hobby and your philosophy. But that's not all there is to it. It's a different matter entirely, when you're forced to kill in order to survive."

"Quiet, lowly cur!" Syo spat, curling the fingers in her hand and grinning with wickedness, using vocabulary Toko would never dare to even mention Byakuya with.

It appeared as if he wasn't expecting the sudden insult either, as he gave a wide eyed look of offense towards Syo's direction. "Lowly...cur?" He echoed.

"I would never kill for a reason as petty as mere survival!" Syo shook her head, her dissent visibly animated. "And! If by some fluke I _did_ kill to survive, why would I bother with the message and arrangement? It'd make me the obvious suspect!"

"That," Celeste pondered her statements for a moment before nodding in agreement. "Does make some amount of sense."

"Plus!" added Syo, dropping her arms so that both hands would be on her hips. "Whatever reason I have for killing, I would _never_ leave out my prized scissors!"

"Maybe you used the dumbbell because you couldn't find any scissors in the school?" Hifumi tried to argue, but was quickly silenced.

"'Any" scissors?" Syo gaped at him as if he had just slandered her entire family line. She spoke with ferocity between gritted teeth, "I don't just use "any" scissors! I only use my own set of high-class, envy of the entire world scissors!"

Yasuhiro shook his head, still unconvinced. "Okay, whatever. There still aren't any in the school."

Syo gave a knowing smirk. One of pure, devious evil and unrighteous atrocity. "Are you sure about that?"

Without hesitating for any resemblance of an answer, she reached both hands beneath the hem of her long, deep purple skirt. When she retracted them with a swift, grand flourish, I could now see long, sleek, razor pairs of silver scissors hanging from each hand. Even the dim lighting of the courtroom glittered on the polished metal blades. There was a wide, malicious smile on her face as she waved the weapons near her face. "Behold!"

Hifumi let out a scream of raw terror. "S-She's fully equipped!"

I had to agree with his horror. A serial killer, standing only a few feet away from me, in possession of her most prized, most dangerous weapons. I suddenly became grateful for not being born a male.

"That's right!" Syo said. "So I can kill anywhere, anytime! Why would I resort to dumbbells or rope, when I have my trusty scissors by my side?" After her brief, paralyzing display of her scissors, she slid them back beneath the fabric of her skirt and smoothened it down with a hand. "Not to mention, I have no clue how to tie a good knot. So rope's totally out of the question anyway!"

Kiyotaka clenched his fist, arms shaking with pent up tension. His voice was full of bewilderment and testiness as he voiced, "I have no idea what's going on anymore! Could such a heinous villain really be innocent?"

I couldn't believe it either. If not Syo, who else was capable of murdering another friend in such a brutal, bloodless fashion? This crime was touched by the hand of a true, knowledgeable professional. Was there another classmate of mine to be afraid of now?

"But..." Mondo began, perplexity lacing his uncertain words. "The body was suspended, right? And nobody but the police knew about that."

"Yeah!" agreed Aoi from his left. "That's why we figured it had to be the real deal, and not some copycat killer or whatever!"

The two did hold a good point. There was a very slim chance that somebody did indeed copy Syo's killings, as the common people did not have any knowledge on the crucification. The only people who knew about that specific detail on Genocider Syo's murders, were the higher-up police workers and world leaders in possession of government related documents. 

The only people who could have possibly replicated the crime, was someone who had read the files themselves.

"Hang on." I tried to project my voice loud enough to catch everyone's attention, but it was difficult to do so and not let my tone tremble at the same time. I lifted my gaze from off my podium to stare straight into the eyes of Byakuya Togami.

"I think you could have done it, Byakuya."

A collection of stunned gasps and startled noises immediately began to drown the room. Judging from the shared reaction, it was obvious that nobody ever suspected that possibility. 

I continued to explain my choice of answer. "You'd have no problem gaining access to classified government documents or internal police records. Plus," I added when he gave me a wordless look of challenge towards my way, "you'd already looked through the Genocider Syo file before this all happened, right?"

When Byakuya held no such response to my allegations, Hifumi began to tremble and sweat with distress. "A-Are you saying...Mr. Togami did it?" 

Still, silence from the accused party. Celeste turned to her right in order to face the soundless Byakuya, furrowing her eyebrows in suspicion. "Then, the reason you pushed the theory of Genocider Syo being the killer so hard was because you wanted to pin the crime on her, no?"

"So, he rearranged the scene to disguise it and make it look like I'd put my stamp on it!" rhapsodized Syo, a trill in her voice. She hugged both of her shoulders, shivering, and sighed out of pure pleasure. "The adorable glasses man was behind it all? Ahh, I'm on fire!"

Ignoring her yet again perverted response, Kiyotaka jabbed an interrogating finger across the court room, demanding, "Well, Byakuya? What's your response?"

Finally, he spoke. Using his fingers, Byakuya pushed the frames of his glasses higher up his face. "I see. So now the suspicion falls on me." There was an unnerving smirk on his face as he continued to denounce himself with questions. "Then I must ask, when would you say I began acting suspicious? Surely, you must have an answer."

There were a number of times where Byakuya felt out of character for me; his sudden enthusiasm to drag me along to places I was unaware of, his willingness to visit Toko at her dorm, and even the offer he made to investigate with me. I chose to pick out the earliest act. "Hmm," I began. "Looking back and thinking about it now, the way you were acting right before we discovered the body was really strange. You wanted to go to the girls locker room right away, right? But since you're a guy-"

"I should have naturally thought of the boys locker room first." He finished for me, cutting my sentence off clean. "Is that what you wanted to say?" He gave me a glare of venom and menace. "The victim was Chihiro. A girl. Hence why I said we should check the girls locker room. And since _you_ were with me, I thought we should begin there first."

"But up until we actually discovered the body," I argued back, refuting his previous contradictions. "We couldn't have known who the victim actually was. So, your claim that you wanted to check the girls locker room first because Chihiro was the victim doesn't hold up!"

Even after his defense had been disproved, Byakuya still chuckled rather amusingly to himself. "I see. That's a good answer, I must admit." The gaze inside his icy eyes suddenly dropped to a temperature far below freezing. "Interesting. Very interesting, indeed. But your reasoning is still too weak, Junko."

"Huh?" An unintelligible gasp forced its way out from my throat. 

"What's wrong? Is that it?" Calling his behavior strange was an understatement. It seemed as if he was still trying to defend himself, while at the same time, he was egging me on to prove him wrong with stronger evidence. Nothing he said or did chalked up to any sense. "Surely, you've got more than that. Go ahead, show us."

It took me a while to find my ability to comprehend and respond. His attitude puzzled me to no end; he acted as if he didn't even care about being a cornered culprit. In fact, he was so laid back, it was like he didn't have anything to do with the case at all. He wanted me to prove him wrong, but what for? To blame himself? 

"What's the matter?" He taunted yet again at my lack of answer. "You're not finished already, are you? There must be more to it."

I tried to unearth more bleary memories that proved his guilt. What else was there? "Th-There is. I think."

"There _is_ more to it." Kyoko spoke up for the first time in a while during this trial. "Think about it. We just talked about the differences between this case and past Genocider Syo incidents. The arrangements of the bodies were different, right? Syo crucifies her victims with scissors, while Chihiro was suspended with a rope."

That was correct; one of the most major differences between the two cases were the arrangements of the corpses. I could still see that horrifying image, clear as day, inside my traumatized mind. Chihiro's bloodless, small, pale hands, strung and tied with a long rope of sorts. At least, that's what I had thought. Another image came into my stream of consciousness: a sleek silver plug hanging at the tail of the rope. It was an extension cord, I suddenly recalled my earlier observations. The library was missing one of those, so it had to have originated from there.

"A rope?" Byakuya snorted at her argument, crossing his arms with arrogance. "I'd never seen that rope in my life. Obviously, somebody else must have had it hidden away somewhere."

"Actually," I cleared my throat, trying to descramble all of my thoughts into coherent explanations. "I'm pretty sure you _have_ seen it before. That wasn't a rope- it was an extension cord."

At this, Hifumi abruptly cried out, "What? An extension cord?"

"Byakuya," He stabbed through my own eyes with that sharp stare of his. It pushed me to the point of discomfort where I almost regretted speaking up. "Y-You've used the extension cord in the library more than once, right? And the extension cord, which had been in the library all this time, went missing after the murder. There's no way someone who uses that extension cord as much as you do wouldn't discover that fact."

Kiyotaka clenched in fist once again, shouting with accusation, "Then Byakuya must be the one who took the extension cord! I can't imagine any other possibility!"

There was a brief moment of dead silence, awaiting another snarky remark of defense from Byakuya. Not a single person dared to speak and shatter the quietude. The tension that clouded the air was so thick, it was near impossible to breathe and clear my lungs. My fingers naturally made their way to fidget with the hairbands strung on my wrist.

"I see." said Byakuya after a long pause. His voice was flat and passionless, completely and utterly composed. "Then your conclusion is something like this: I killed Chihiro in the girls locker room, then hung her up and wrote that bloody message. I intentionally made it look like Genocider Syo was behind it." There was a hint of challenge in his tone. "Is that about right?"

Even after hearing his confession, there was still something that remained and didn't quite fall in place. Perhaps it was Byakuya's wholly unconcerned tone, or maybe it was the dreadful silence from the rest of the class, but no matter, I felt as if there was something off about his statement. 

The girls locker room. How could he have entered and killed inside of the girls locker room?

"What's wrong?" There he went again, taunting and puzzling the rest of us with his reprimands. "I asked you if you think that's what happened."

"Hell yes that's what happened!" Mondo instantly agreed, although it was more of an aggressive concur rather than a sympathetic one. "So that's it, right? Byakuya's the killer!"

"I don't disagree with not disagreeing!" Syo cheered, waving her fingers yet again for a dramatic effect.

"He kept calling this a game, right?" Kiyotaka recollected, crossing his arms firmly across his chest. "So he'd totally be willing to do something like this to "win"!"

It seemed as if nobody had even caught onto the obvious contradiction. Everyone was joining forces to corner Byakuya, yet they were missing a crucial detail in his summary. "Um," I attempted to call out over the growing chorus of voices. It appeared to have worked, as everybody's eyes immediately flickered to me the second the word left my lips. "Sorry, but can we hold on for a second? There's something that's still bothering me." When I saw no shared agreement, I quickly grew exasperated. "Wait, none of you guys noticed?"

"What is there to be noticed?" Byakuya continued to jeer. "I killed her in the girls locker room, then disguised my crime. Specifically, I dressed it up to make it look like it was the work of a homicidal psychopath. What about that "bothers" you?"

I got him to say it again. Now, I was almost completely certain of my rationalization; there was no way he could have killed, or even entered, inside the girls locker room without being shot to death with a Gatling gun. For him to have possibly murdered Chihiro, the crime must have taken someplace else, then moved to the girls locker room in order to disguise the actual scene.

"You say you killed Chihiro in the girls locker room, right?" I repeated, my words slower than usual as I tried to think my theory over and over. "But you couldn't have entered the girls locker room without getting shot. Isn't it possible that the murder took place somewhere else?"

He scoffed at my suggestion, as if it were the most outrageous idea he has ever heard in his life. "How disappointing." He spat, shaking his head with grimace. "What kind of question is that? Use that somewhat tiny brain of yours and think for once. She was found dead in the girls locker room. There is absolutely no question about that. How could the scene of the crime have been anywhere else?"

Despite his atrocious insults and unnecessary comments, I didn't let my hypothesis break down with such a simple rebuttal. "Well," I narrowed my eyes, staring down at the glittery tiled floors in front of me with ponder. "I think it's entirely possible that she was killed somewhere else, then carried there later. Along with the rest of the murder scene."

I knew my theory was rather farfetched, but I couldn't let it go if it was a possibility. Byakuya gave me a pointed look of perplexity, almost as if he was caught off guard. "The...rest of the murder scene?" He took a few seconds to digest my words before proceeding to push with, "That was awfully specific. Please tell me you have a reason for saying all that."

I saw a slight crack in his armor, a waver in his stature. He had been so collected, so confident up until now, yet when the discussion shifted to the topic of the crime scene, he suddenly wasn't so convinced. Perhaps, he had never realized or considered the chance that the actual scene of the murder could be somewhere else.

"Hey!" Kiyotaka's demand was what drew me out from my pile of thoughts. "Don't just move on without permission! What do you mean she was killed somewhere else?"

"Come on, Junko!" Byakuya's reprimands added onto Kiyotaka's previous ones, impatient that I had been thinking for too long. "If there's any chance the murder took place somewhere else, let's see the proof!"

This hypothesis of mine was only based off on odd gut feelings and weak points, but perhaps it was enough to prove it right. I tried to zero in on the strangest observations of the scene today; the posters, and the carpets in the two changing rooms. It appeared as if the two were almost switched overnight: the coffee stained carpet that had been inside the girls locker room, according to Sakura's witness, was now in the boys locker room, and same goes for the posters. My guesstimate was that the place in question was the boys locker room, despite its bizarreness. I could only hope that the others would agree to such impossibilities. 

Unfortunately, this was as far as I could get with my own theory. As to why and how the murder even took place in the mens locker room was still a mystery to me. But I couldn't dismiss it entirely either. If I were to make a mistake, better now than later.

"The proof that she was killed somewhere else is," I started, narrowing my eyes as I attempted to scour for the right words. "The poster that's hanging in each locker room. The poster in the girls locker room was a picture of a, um, "big-boobed" supermodel. Isn't that kinda strange? Why would the girls locker room have a poster like that?"

"I bet those massive jugs of hers were totally fake!" Syo commented with a string of shrill laughter. "Just like Junk food's!"

I figured it'd be better I ignore her unneeded commentary and proceed without dwelling too much on the insult. Yet still, I couldn't stop my eyes from rolling in vexation as I continued, "Meanwhile, the boys locker room had a poster of the super popular boy band, Tornado. Again, that doesn't really seem to belong in a boys locker room."

"So you're saying that maybe the posters were switched?" confirmed Celeste.

Byakuya scoffed in high dismissal of my counterargument. "Your proof is some posters? That sounds like a rather weak statement."

"There's more." My eyelids fluttered to a shut as I set each sentence of my explanation into place. The swapped carpets were supporting proofs as well. I reopened my eyes to flicker and glance towards Sakura's direction. "There was one more thing that was switched between the rooms. You know what I'm talking about, right Sakura?"

She returned my mutual look and said, "You're referring to my protein coffee, aren't you?"

"Protein...coffee?" Hifumi echoed from beside me, audibly confused by the sudden upbringing.

"While I was in the girls locker room last night," Sakura began to elaborate. "I spilled some protein coffee on the carpet. But I noticed that after the murder, the stain had been totally scrubbed away."

"Except the stain on the girls locker room carpet wasn't scrubbed away," I could still see the image of a coffee brown mark on the mousy carpet inside the mens room clear in my mind. That much could offer as supporting evidence. "In fact, I found it on the boys locker room carpet."

At the mention of such a stain, Sakura's eyes abruptly broadened in realization. "That...must be the stain from my protein coffee!"

Celeste had been following along my idea quite well. She touched a finger to her lips when she piped, "Then, does that mean that the carpets were switched, too?" Her dark eyebrows furrowed against the pale skin of her face. "But, why would anyone do that?"

Again, I was only theorizing, but I determined it was at least worth a shot. "To move the murder scene from one locker room to the other. It's certainly possibly, don't you think?" I said. 

Kiyotaka's stature flinched at my suggestion, eyes wide with a blend of shock and puzzlement. "What?" He cried out in surprise.

"In other words," Kyoko nodded along with the statement, and I felt a breathtaking wave of relief that someone had finally agreed. "In order to completely swap the scene of the crime, the bloodstained poster and carpet were moved along with the dead body. By doing this, the killer was able to change the entire room where the murder took place."

With a light sigh, Celeste's hands fell to clasp together in front of her lacy dress. "I can certainly follow your reasoning, but," she paused for just a split second, "why would the culprit bother doing that?"

I had gotten the basics of the logic and evidence down, but there was still a strong motive missing. My foot took a step back from my podium, faltering as I admitted, "Huh?" 

"Why would they go to all that trouble of switching the scene of the crime?" She proceeded without giving me any time to even begin pondering. Her questions were swift, sharp, and forced my reasoning to a point of improbable thinking. "Actually, an even bigger question: if the murder did take place in the boys locker room, then how did Chihiro get in the boys locker room in the first place?"

That was the chink in my armor. I knew from the very moment I formed my theory that it would be impossible for Chihiro to get into the boys locker room in order to be killed. It was a weakness I did not have a response to, so instead, I settled on a startled choked noise for an answer.

Celeste immediately resumed, so quickly that I could not even gather my own scattered thoughts. "To get into the locker rooms, you have to swipe your e-handbook across the card reader device," she said, tone full of doubtful challenge. "But Chihiro's handbook should have only allowed her access to the girls locker room. She had no way to get into the boys locker room to begin with."

"No, she _did_ have a way!" Yasuhiro exclaimed with a proposition of his own. "And I can tell you exactly what it was!"

Celeste sighed once again, except this time, she sounded far more exhausted. "I highly doubt that." She remarked, beginning to twirl and play with a loose part of her bangs.

"Shut up!" argued Yasuhiro. "I'm telling you, I know how she could have done it!"

But before he could even start to explain what exactly it was, Kiyotaka snapped his fingers and straightened his back at once. "Ah! I've got it!" He announced. "She must have hacked her e-handbook! She was the Ultimate Programmer, after all. I'm sure that would've been no problem for her!"

Even though the rest of the class had rekindled their debate, I still couldn't find an answer to contend with. I wasn't one to doubt skills, but I was highly certain that she didn't hack her own e-handbook. There was no use for it after all, and I never saw nor heard her talking about it. That left me with absolutely no leads again. Through frustrated, anxious thoughts, I decided it was better if I honed in on others' suggestions.

Yasuhiro shook his head, arms crossed over one another. "No, I don't think that's it." He rejected Kiyotaka's idea with his own. "She used the thing that was in the main hall!"

"Huh?" Hifumi blinked, ever the more puzzled by the trial. Something told me he didn't investigate too much this time around. "What thing?"

"I'm talkin' about Leon's handbook, of course!" replied Yasuhiro, seemingly optimistic about his answer. "If she had that, she could get into the boys locker room no problem!"

Another new presumption caused me to consider it over in my own mind. I had already crossed out Kiyotaka's, and Yasuhiro's was next to evaluate. He was referring to the handbooks in the main hall. There were three that belonged to the dead students: Sayaka, Leon, and Makoto. Yet, Leon's handbook was not functioning, as it remained blank despite futile attempts of turning it on. It would have been impossible for Chihiro to use a broken handbook.

"No, I don't think Chihiro used Leon's handbook." I rebutted, my head slowly shaking as I reconfirmed the thought. 

"Why not?" demanded Yasuhiro, slightly hurt by such a blunt refusal. 

"Because Leon's handbook was broken." I explained. "There's no way she could have used that to get inside the boys locker room."

"Th-Then she used Makoto's!" He countered, pointing a shaking finger towards my direction as if to dare me. "His wasn't broken, right?"

I was struck speechless at that statement. Yes, it was possible for Chihiro to have used Makoto's handbook, and there wasn't any evidence to deduct that either. My throat ran dry as I fidgeted with the rubber bands on my wrists, trying desperately to rack my brain for answers. Nothing.

"Monokuma," I ended up resorting to asking the least reliable person in this room. I lifted my gaze to stare across the circle and saw his head tilting to the left, awaiting my request. "Were any of the handbooks used in this case?"

He pondered this over for a few soundless moments, most likely debating whether or not he should give us another hint. He made some strange, extended noise of consideration before saying, "Only one was used! But it wasn't Makoto's! Who would want to touch that filthy little thing?" He then proceeded to giggle to himself at a joke humorless to man. I sighed, disappointed yet unsurprised. 

"Well, there's your answer." My own voice echoed of defeat as Monokuma's laughter continued to ring out through the vast hall. 

"One was used?" Kyoko instantaneously picked up on that one, small detail. Her head raised in apprehension. "That must be Sayaka's, right? To get into the girls locker room?" 

"But isn't there a regulation against using someone else's handbook?" Celeste pointed out with clear dissent. 

For the first time in quite a while, Byakuya spoke up. "Actually, the rule states that loaning your handbook is prohibited." He stated matter-of-factly, recalling the newest rule that had been just implemented a few days ago. "It says nothing about borrowing one. In other words, you could borrow a dead person's handbook all you want, and you'd be safe."

"So if she didn't use Leon's _or_ Makoto's," Kiyotaka raised his voice in solid objection. "Then she must have hacked hers like I said! She used her Ultimate Programmer skills, and-"

"Bzzt!" interrupted Monokuma, suddenly chatty ever since I had called upon him to speak. "You can't fix an e-handbook. The instant you open one up, a security buzzer starts blaring!"

One guess after the other, all shot down and proven false. We were beginning to run dry of options, to the point where I even started to doubt my own original idea of the crime taking place in the boys locker room. Maybe, I shouldn't have been so adamant on pressing this theory so hard? I couldn't think of any other way to actually support that.

"So if she didn't use anyone else's handbooks," Sakura summarized, a thick look of concern upon her face. "And she didn't modify her own handbook..."

"Maybe Ms. Enoshima's initial assumption is just...wrong?" questioned Hifumi, sweat beginning to bead on his forehead. I couldn't exactly disagree with him on that either.

Aoi shook her head, as if admitting defeat. "It seems like there's no way she coulda got into the boys locker room," she mumbled with a fatigued tone. "So, I guess so."

Heavily contrasting the reluctance of the previous two, Kiyotaka immediately jumped onto the discussion of voting time. He thrusted a confident finger towards Byakuya's direction, proclaiming, "Okay then, I vote for Byakuya!"

As a growing yet hesitant chorus of agreements began to rise in the room, I couldn't help but feel off. There was something missing, I was sure of it, but I just didn't know what. This couldn't have possibly been the end of this case; Chihiro was murdered in the girls locker room, and Byakuya was the killer?

No matter how much I tried to convince myself, there were just too many things contradicting this version. It wouldn't explain why the posters and the carpets were switched, and the motive was still rather unclear too. Monokuma did mention that one handbook, Sayaka's, was used to get into the girls locker room, but judging from his expression at the upbringing of the setting, I doubted Byakuya was the one who used it.

A silent curse slipped from under my breath. Was this really how it all played out?

I couldn't find any leads to continue the debate, but someone else did. 

"Hold on a second." Kyoko's voice was like a sword cutting through stone, sharp, solid. It held so much power and authority, that it caught a hold of everyone in the room, including Monokuma on top his throne. "Don't be so sure that Chihiro couldn't get into the boys locker room. There's still one other way she could have gained access."

From her left, Mondo backed up so swiftly, he almost fell like Leon did. His eyes declared his disbelief for her points. "What?"

And he wasn't the only one to have this reaction either. Kiyotaka's head snapped around to narrow and meet his eyes with hers. "What are you talking about? What other way is there?"

"The answer is simple." said Kyoko.

But the reply that escaped from her lips was far from anything I could ever even dream of. 

"Chihiro Fujisaki was a boy."

Even all the mystified screams in the world couldn't explain my raw, sheer shock. 

But the bewildered cries and yells of all of my classmates seemingly made a match. Not a single person had even considered this possibility the slightest, thus our shared, collective outrage. I could no longer hear my own heart beat inside my chest. It had completely halted into a frozen stop, leaving me utterly breathless. 

The shy, sweet, warm girl, a friend of mine who I could call close, was not a girl, but rather, a boy. My head began to spiral into a dizzying loop. How did I not notice? Their claims of being weak, their determination of getting stronger, their sense of worthless self loathing. Even the way they avoided swimming suits and locker rooms. I wasn't sure if I was more taken aback by their deception or my own failure to notice.

Was that what the truth was? Just a lie crafted by another person?

Yasuhiro's once melanin skin paled into a shade of ash. His breath was hitched in his throat, unbelieving when he forced out, "You're joking, right?"

"No, I'm one hundred percent serious." Kyoko shook her head, but her words were like melted ice to my disorientated ears. I felt as if all the air inside my lungs had been shoved out of my chest in one wheezy exhale. "I discovered it while I was searching the body."

Kiyotaka's voice was barely even audible from all of the shock and horror that slammed his body. "Th-Th-Then..." His eyes grew wider than I had thought was possible. "Then it's really true?" 

"WHAAAAT?" cried Hifumi, his scream loud enough to voice everyone's bewilderment in one.

For the second time that day, I couldn't even recognize my own voice. It was so hoarse, so low, so pained, that it didn't even seem to belong to a human. "Chihiro was..." I found difficulty in merely breathing. "A guy?"

Monokuma merely tilted his head to one side, ignoring the absolute chaos shattering in front of him. "Oh, what, you guys didn't know? Chihiro Fujisaki was totally a guy!"

"Well," It was the first time I ever saw Kyoko hesitate before speaking, her voice uncertain and reluctant. She ultimately crossed her arms over her chest in attempts to buy time. "I don't know their reason for hiding it, but the fact is, Chihiro was biologically born a boy. And because the victim's gender was listed as male, they would have had no problem gaining access to the boys locker room."

We leaped back into the debate so quickly, I barely had any time to recover my breathing, much less my own mind. I didn't think I could even last through this trial anymore, but nonetheless, I tried. Blocking out every ponder and question that clogged my brain was a difficult task, if not the most difficult, and I could still hardly hear anything Kyoko said over the roar of my own inner thoughts.

"So then," she proceeded too rapidly. "There should be no problem with Junko's initial assertion. The victim was killed in the boys locker room, and was then later moved to the girls locker room. And using the process of elimination, we can deduct that the killer is male as well."

"Huh?" inquired Yasuhiro, seemingly still not recovered from his immense shock. "Wait, how do you know that?"

"Monokuma just told us that only one dead student's e-handbook was used, right?" Kyoko elaborated, sparing a sharp glance towards the robotic bear on top the throne. "Leon's was broken, and we already disqualified Makoto's. So, that leaves Sayaka's handbook for usage. Monokuma confirmed that it was indeed used, so there should be no room for doubt that the killer is male."

Kiyotaka's face was even paler than his uniform, beads of sweat beginning to run down the side of his forehead. "So Chihiro really was killed in the boys locker room?" He exclaimed with a trembling horror of realization. 

"I still don't understand the motive for moving the body," admitted Kyoko. "But yes. That does seem plausible."

"So now, everything has been connected." Even Byakuya appeared a bit off guard when he finally spoke. Yet, he quickly covered his disturbance up by swiftly pushing his glasses up on the bridge of his nose, and changed his expression in an instant. "All the mysteries have finally become clear."

"Okay, well," Aoi jumped right back into her usual fiery attitude as soon as she heard Byakuya's voice. "Connected or clear, or whatever, we still think _you're_ the killer, remember?"

In response, Byakuya merely chuckled, returning to his smug smirk alongside a cross of his arms. "Very interesting. This has become very interesting indeed."

Hifumi shook his head with a sigh and mumbled, "Ah, he's off in his own little world."

Ignoring those two, Kyoko turned her head around to shoot me down with a questioning stare. Even before she began speaking, she started to interrogate me with just her eyes. "What about you, Junko? After everything we've learned, do you still think Byakuya's the killer?"

Her inquiry drifted across the room and sank deep into the depths of my brain. I pondered it for quite some time, deliberating my answer.

I couldn't think of anyone else who could have possibly crucified Chihiro's corpse. The inconsistencies, the obvious clues left behind, all pointed to Byakuya, almost too clearly, it seemed. But even if he was the one to string up the body and write the message, it didn't necessarily mean he was the one who killed them. 

If the crime did happen in the boys locker room, then the killer was most definitely the one who switched things between the two changing rooms. However, at the mention of that possibility, he appeared caught off guard, surprised, almost. It was as if he never even considered that fact in the first place. It wasn't a stretch to say that he had found the body in the girls locker room and set it up, presumably assuming that Chihiro was killed there.

In addition, when Chihiro's sex was revealed, Byakuya looked just as shocked as the rest of us to learn. No one could ever fake such a genuine bewilderment like that. If he truly was the culprit, then he would have already known from the start that Chihiro was born male. Everything began to add up in my head.

"Well," I started to explain, fingers mindlessly tapping against the hard wooden surface of my podium. "Without a doubt, Byakuya's the one that made Chihiro's death look like Genocider Syo did it. But," I paused, trying to find the best way to word my reply. "I don't think he's actually the killer."

"What?" exclaimed Hifumi, snapping his head around to face me through eyes of disbelief. "But aren't you the one who accused him in the first place?"

I shook my head in denial, my hands now gripping the rough edges of the stand. "He just seems to be too...easygoing about all this." I noted his unusually calm behavior, even when he was supposedly cornered. "Like he's enjoying us solving the mystery. The way he's acting, it makes it seem like it doesn't even have anything to do with him."

"And you think that might be because it _doesn't_ have anything to do with him?" questioned Celeste.

"Also," I added. I could see that my knuckles were growing pale from the tight tension in my fingers, yet I didn't let go. "The evidence he left behind was way too obvious. He purposely used the extension cord, knowing it could connect him to the murder. And Byakuya," I managed to lift my gaze from my hands to glance to my right, where he stood without a sound and only daring glares. "When you found out the murder took place in the boys locker room, it seemed to rattle you. And then again, when you found out that Chihiro was actually born male. If you really were the killer, that stuff wouldn't have any effect on you."

The man in question let out a sigh of unreadable emotion, letting his arms fall from his chest and drop next to his sides. "So that's your thinking, huh?" He said it as if it were a taunt more than a query, a small smirk playing his lips once again. "Well, it bothers me that you don't have more concrete reasons, but it's fine. I guess I'll mark it correct, for the time being."

Aoi blinked furiously from her end of the circle, visibly confused by his wording. "Mark it as...correct?"

"She's right." Byakuya admitted, slamming both hands against the face of his podium. A loud echo erupted into the air, commanding silence for every being in the courtroom. "I am not the culprit."

"What?" Aoi's eyes were wide with noiseless shock. "No way."

"I just happened to come across the corpse in the girls locker room, and decided to "alter" it." He explained, as if it were any help at all.

Mondo's teeth were gritted in pure, red hot fury. His fists clenched and trembled with rage. "Are you fucking with us right now?" He growled.

Byakuya gave him a stone look through flat eyes. "No, I am not...effing with you right now. I'm telling you the truth."

Kiyotaka's tone was strained with unbelieving. "Well, I find it very hard to believe!" He said.

"Go ahead." jeered Byakuya, scoffing out of amusement. "Find it very hard to believe. You're free to be executed along with the rest of us."

At his confession, Aoi seemed even more angry than when she had accused him of murder. "If you're really telling the truth, then why? Why'd you do that to their body?"

"My reasons hardly matter right now." Byakuya defended, although his smug expression never flinched. "Uncovering the culprit is much more important, wouldn't you say? If it wasn't me, who was it?"

"We don't really have any good leads now," my hands let go of their firm grasp, tautness releasing from the tips of my fingers. "So I think we should probably keep talking more."

Yasuhiro groaned, ruffling his hair with one hand out of discontent. "We're seriously gonna keep going?" He complained. "We're all good, aren't we? I thought it was clear Byakuya did it!"

Kyoko shook her head, dismissing his objections. "No, I'm with Junko. If there's any doubt whatsoever, we need to explore every possibility. Because, if we're wrong," her eyes of lavender glinted with ice for just a split second, "we all die here."

"That's true." Celeste nodded, a dainty smile placed on her face with elegance. She folded her hands right beneath her chin. "Very well then. I'm with you too." She concurred.

"Anyway, let's discuss this all as a group one more time," I offered, straightening my back to stand more upright behind my seat. I hadn't even noticed the aching sore in my spine until now. "We still have time to make our decision. We need to find a more confident answer."

"That's very true." inclined Sakura.

Aoi's shoulders slumped in exhaustion, but never defeat. "Our lives are all on the line." She mumbled.

Seeing our collective response, Byakuya's smirk only grew with more avidity. "Excellent!" He said, voice almost deriding. "Then shall we resume our game of hide and seek?"

Even after his innocence related to the crime had been proven, Byakuya still terrified me to no end. The fact that he had purposely tried to frame Syo for a murder she didn't even know of, and almost tried to lead us off the wrong end, haunted my soul. Why would he do that, tricking us into a path leading towards death? It was as if he wanted to kill us all, or at the very least, confuse us. He had no regard for human life, it seemed. He had disrupted a murder scene and even distorted Chihiro's dead body. Was there even a limit to his madness?

I couldn't dwell on Byakuya's motives forever, I scolded myself. We were in a crucial situation, betting our lives for the trade of another. If we dare to make a mistake, we'd lose it all.

"Isn't there a single clue that might lead us to who did it?" Sakura's voice drew me out from my thoughts, much to my relief.

"Well, clues are one thing, but," Kiyotaka began with a troubled look of unease stretched upon his features. "Did nobody get a look at the killer?"

Yasuhiro's head dropped and shook with disappointment, arms crossed. "I'm sure if someone saw the killer, they woulda said something by now." He muttered.

"Perhaps someone saw the victim at some point." suggested Sakura, leading us on in this tense discussion. "Even that might be enough for now."

A person who saw the victim before the murder. I racked and shook my brain for any possible answers. Earlier, during the investigation, Byakuya had me go around and collect the accounts of multiple people for more knowledge on the crime. Perhaps, one of those questioned saw Chihiro before they died?

My conversation with Celeste was replayed in my mind, and I got my response.

"You wanna know who saw the victim?" groaned Yasuhiro, appearing ready to give it all up. "The killer! And only the killer."

"No, wait." My eyes frantically scanned the room to eye Celeste, and we made eye contact. "Celeste, you saw Chihiro that night, didn't you?"

She began to twirl a shock of dark hair around a slim finger, replying with, "Now that you mention it, yes. I did see them."

Hifumi was appalled to hear this new piece of information. "Huh? Really?" He echoed.

"Oh, but I suppose only Junko knows about this." She explained, letting go of her bangs and allowing it to caress her cheek. "It was last night, right before nighttime. I saw Chihiro in the dormitory warehouse. I saw them stuffing a track jacket into a duffel bag. And then, I assume, they headed off to exercise."

Kiyotaka furrowed his eyebrows deeply in ponder at Celeste's words. "A track jacket and a duffel bag? But we didn't find anything like that at the murder scene!"

"It seems likely that the culprit destroyed them to get rid of any evidence." Sakura said in answer to Kiyotaka's exclamations.

Celeste continued to recall her account, bringing a finger to her lips as she spoke. "And that's when they said something that struck me as rather odd. Chihiro told me they were, "in a hurry.'" She paused for a slight moment to frown at the memory. "But why would they be in a hurry? Only if someone were waiting for them, I should think."

"So Chihiro was on their way to meet with someone, and then they were going to work out together?" assumed Hifumi, uncertainty lacing his pending sentences. 

"But Hina and I had invited them to exercise with us plenty of times, and they always declined." Sakura's eyes narrowed in perplexity. I remember her words stating the exact same thing earlier, when I had questioned her during the investigation. Apparently, the reason why Chihiro went to work out during such late times was to avoid running into Sakura and Aoi. It did make sense, I decided.

"Probably 'cause they were afraid you'd find the secret they were hiding, right?" said Yasuhiro, confirming my own wonders. 

Celeste let her arm drop from her face, and reached out to smoothen down her lacy dress. "Which means that conversely, they must have trusted whoever they were meeting with very much. Enough so that they were willing to risk their secret being revealed."

Syo, who I hadn't heard speak in quite some time, giggled perversely out loud. "What a marvelous friendship!" She exclaimed with a breathy sigh.

Ignoring her comment, Aoi crossed her arms and sank deep into thought. "The point is," she began. "Whoever they met up with is the culprit, right? So we just gotta figure out who it was!"

It was easy enough to just say, "let's find out who the culprit is." But how to get there, was a path built solely on evidence. We didn't nearly have enough verification to discover who the killer was, and I found myself utterly stuck in the midst of this trial. Our only lead was that the culprit was someone Chihiro trusted very much, and was male. There were a lot of males, and none of them seem to scream, "I am a killer". If we wanted to unearth the truth behind this case, we needed to take a different approach in narrowing out the murderer.

"But knowing what we know," my voice was reluctant and heavy as I voiced my own concerns out to the group. "I can't even guess. We don't have enough evidence."

"No." My head snapped up to meet Kyoko's eyes of stone across the trial room. Her gaze was solid and set, but confident and reassuring in its own way. There was a trace of a smile on her lips when she caught my eye. "You already have what you need to make the connection."

Her words were so sure, so certain, that I thought I had misheard her. Was there something I was missing? Was I not thinking hard enough? "H-Huh?" I forced out, just as confused on my own.

"You know who the killer is." She uttered. Her smile was now a slight smirk, like she knew something we didn't, and was egging me on to learn.

Kiyotaka backed up from his stand, eyes wide with utter disbelief. "S-Seriously?" He cried out.

From her left, Mondo's panic surged to match up with everyone else in the room. His head instantly whipped around to gawk at Kyoko. "Wh-Who is it?" He demanded, fingers curling into a fist once again. "Who's the killer?"

"Think back to the track jacket and duffel bag the killer disposed of." She answered, eyebrows knitted together as she prompted us to recollect. "Focus on the details of these items, and it should become obvious who was waiting for them."

Celeste gave her a daring look of question, her frown deepening with her newly found concern. "Are you sure about that?" She chided, tilting her head to one side. "You really think we can figure out who did it based on two pieces of evidence that we don't have?"

As much as I hated to admit it, I agreed with her to some extent. It seemed near impossible to deduct certain points from missing clues; none of us had even seen the bag and the jersey other than Celeste. I wasn't sure if this was quite the right place to go, as we had so many holes in our argument. I didn't even know what she was planning, much less how we were able to find the killer from here.

But when my weary eyes drifted back to Kyoko once again, I knew that she wasn't mistaking herself at all. From the looks of her unflinching face alone, I could tell that she knew exactly what she was doing. It was better not to doubt her now, even if I was hesitant on the matter. So, I bit back my worries on a sharp tongue and listened.

"Yes, the clues may be gone from our sight," nodded Kyoko, her tone so even and resolute, it planted seeds of poise in my wavering heart. "But we _can_ make certain inferences, if we just take the time to talk it out."

Aoi shook her head, clearly struggling to keep up with the whole discussion. "Easy for you to say." She grumbled beneath her breath before letting go a hefty sigh. "But fine. Celeste, did you notice anything special about the bag or jacket?" She turned to face the eye witness for interrogation.

"The bag was... just a normal duffel bag from the warehouse." noted Celeste, her sentences pausing as she attempted to remember the specific appearances of the two clues last night. "All the bags in there are the same, so I can't imagine what would make that one special."

Sakura added on to Celeste's list of observations. "Well, if I remember right," she started to explain. "There was a decent variety of tracksuits to choose from. Do you think there might be some connection between the culprit and Chihiro's jacket?"

"Perhaps." answered Kyoko, nodding along to display her agreement. "Let's explore that, and talk a bit more about the jacket they took."

That one did seem a bit farfetched for me. A simple tracksuit can help us single out who the killer was? It could be anybody in the room, or at least, any boy anyway. I could literally be standing beside the culprit, unknown to the fact that they had murdered my friend. My head was growing dizzier and dizzier with each new vile thought, preparing to burst at the seams with too many unanswered questions.

The only thing I could do for now was hone in, and put my trust in Kyoko.

"First of all," she cleared her throat, ready to begin the debate of life or death. "We know where Chihiro was headed: they were on their way to go exercise. So, next we have to ask, "Why did they choose the specific tracksuit that they did?'"

"What do you mean, "the specific tracksuit"?" Byakuya and I seemed to have the same wonders. 

Kiyotaka perked up from his seat with a sudden discovery. He slammed a palm against his podium, shouting, "I got it! They picked out that tracksuit because it matched the one the culprit was wearing!"

"So what you're saying is," Mondo repeated for confirmation, a troubled sweat breaking over his face as he pondered. "The killer was wearing the same blue tracksuit as them? Well, my tracksuit is black."

Hifumi shook his head from beside me, muttering in a deflated disappointment, "I-I don't even have a tracksuit. 'Cause exercising sucks!"

"I have a white tracksuit, personally." Yasuhiro piped up.

Kyoko's piercing eyes of steel returned back to stare me down, pressing against my chest with enough pressure to knock the air from my lungs. "You heard that, right? What he just said without realizing?"

With a cold blooded realization, I perceived that she was urging me to study the last few remnants of the conversation. My eyes flickered to gaze down at my podium, vision quivering and trembling as I tried the best I could to recall. I didn't even realize how hard my jaw was clenched until I felt the pain.

The discussion had now moved on to the topic of tracksuit colors, with each boy claiming his innocence by proving that their tracksuit didn't match with Chihiro's. Not one person added that they had an identical blue jersey.

Blue jersey. Just like what Celeste had told me, Chihiro had a blue tracksuit that they were hurriedly stuffing into a duffel bag last night. They were in such a haste, I doubted anyone else could have seen and known the color other than Celeste, and I, who had been informed of just hours ago.

So how did Mondo know it was blue?

"Hold on a second, Mondo." I couldn't believe how hoarse my own voice sounded in my throat. My gaze flitted from my smooth reflection on the tile ground, to stare straight into the fretful, anxious violet eyes of Mondo Owada. "What did you say?"

Without a doubt, he was perplexed by my reprimands. He raised an eyebrow out of puzzlement, and with a tone of unease, asked, "Huh? What'd I say?"

All of a sudden, I felt sick. So sick, I wanted to collapse and cleanse my memories of everything that's happened. I didn't want to believe my own words, but I couldn't prevent them from slipping out from my parched lips. I swallowed with much difficulty, my chest tightening with a breath of trepidation lodged in my throat. "When Celeste testified a few minutes ago, she never said anything about the jacket's color. So how did you know Chihiro's tracksuit was blue?"

Seeing his reaction, so full of aching betrayal, so full of guilty shock, made me even more ill. His eyes grew wider than I had ever seen it become, his hands freezing in midair. Still, I could see it tremble in place, another painful reminder of how mystified he was by my rebuttal. His jaw dropped wide open, but no words fell out. At least, no words I desired to hear anyway. 

"What are you-" He flinched, beginning to rapidly back away from me. I couldn't blame him for his raw fear. "You just-"

"Hey, Celeste." Byakuya's words were all contorted in my ear, and I could barely even make out a single thing that left his lips. He turned to his left in order to face her. "What color _was_ Chihiro's tracksuit?"

"As a matter of fact," she replied, far too collected and calm for such a situation. "It was blue."

"And before we began the trial," Kyoko added, earning another look of inquiry from the gambler. "Did you tell anyone that?"

She simply gave a shook of her head, and dusted off the hem of her gothic black dress. "The only one I told about any of this was Junko." She said.

Sakura's eyes broadened in absolute terror of the truth. She turned her head towards her left to look at Mondo, "Then...Mondo, how did you know what color Chihiro's tracksuit was?"

It was evident that Mondo was rapidly spiraling into pure panic. This was a response only a guilty person could muster; his words failed to connect together into sentences, often halting without any reasoning to continue with. "B-Because I- I just-"

"I-I'm sure he saw the clothes at some point in the investigation!" Kiyotaka attempted to defend his friend, but his obvious anxiety could be heard loud and clear in the shaky, unsure tone of his voice. There were no more excuses to be made, no more defenses for a friend. I knew the contradiction as soon as I heard his vindication for Mondo, but for some reason, I couldn't find the strength to say it out loud.

Fortunately, Kyoko responded for me, her arms crossed in firm denial as she shook her head. "No, that can't be it." She refuted, her stare making Kiyotaka flinch out of appall. "The bag and clothes were surely disposed of by the time we began our investigation."

"Then the only reason he could have known what color the tracksuit was is if he saw Cherry with it before they died!" sang Syo, calling out from her spot two stands beside me. "That's the only possibility!"

"Cherry?" Aoi's eyebrows were furrowed in bafflement at the strange nickname. "Are you talking about Chihiro?"

Ignoring her, Syo jabbed a pair of razor sharp scissors towards Mondo's direction in accusation. "So, how about it?" She hissed out a vigorous demand. "Did you see the tracksuit or didn't you?"

"J-Just by chance..." began Mondo, but it was clear that he was only making desperate pretexts now. His face was ashen and pale at the same time, like he had forgotten how to even breathe. "I just happened to see it last night. They walked past me, and they were carrying the tracksuit in their hands."

"No," My own voice was unnaturally quiet when I finally figured out how to speak again. "That can't be it, either. According to what Celeste said, when she noticed the tracksuit, Chihiro made a point of making sure the jacket was completely in the bag. If you just ran into them briefly, you couldn't possibly have seen what color the tracksuit was."

When he could no longer find a reply to my words, Kyoko uttered, "It would appear you've dug your own grave."

Byakuya had yet another smirk of arrogance on his face, seemingly approving of her statements. "Perhaps, but you handed him the shovel, didn't you? That's why you said what you did." He acknowledged with a rather impressed look. "A bunch of nonsense disguised as a tactic to draw out the true killer."

"Ah, now I understand." quipped Celeste, a small smile taking shape on her lips. "It was all one big bluff, wasn't it? Your true intention was to draw a slip of the tongue from the culprit. That's why you said you knew who did it, to put them on edge."

Kyoko gave the two a nod of concession, confirming their theories. "That's right. However," she shot a sharp glare toward her left. "Mondo was my target all along. I had my suspicions about him from the very beginning."

From the misshapen collection of my hazy memories from the trial, I couldn't think of one time Mondo was ever the slightest bit suspicious. That was the sole reason why I was so mystified to discover his slip up; out of everyone here, I suspected Mondo the very least. It caught me so off guard, I couldn't even register it all through my head.

"But why?" I felt myself frowning. I suffered a lack of comprehension. "What made you so suspicious?"

"That's a good question," remarked Kyoko, a tiny smile residing in her words as she began to explain. "There was a certain turning point that tipped me off. Maybe you didn't notice it, Mondo," she glanced swiftly at the panicked, terrified boy beside her, "but you tend to refer to men and women differently. You only call guys "dude." For girls, it's "chick". And after they were killed, you happened to refer to them as "dude." Once I picked up on that, it occurred to me that Mondo knew something we didn't."

Hifumi gasped, out of alarm or out of awe, it was hard to tell. "Y-You noticed such a tiny detail?" He squeaked out.

"Are you a witch?" Syo snickered out of amusement. "She's a witch! You're positively frightful!"

"No," the aforementioned shook her head, giving a more collected response in contrast to Syo's humor. "I'm not the frightful one. Not nearly as frightful as someone capable of murdering a friend."

Her remarks full of needles dug their way into Mondo's skin, and a choked noise of infuriation and fear fell out from his mouth, slipping through gritted teeth. His frame was trembling, shaking, and I had to force myself to raise my head and make eye contact with him. When I did, I only saw raw, sheer horror pooling in his eyes.

"Mondo," it was a challenge to even open my mouth and talk. My hands were shivering, sensitive to the death ridden air. I had to grasp onto the podium in order to steady myself, digging my nails into the hard wood until I felt splinters. "Was it really you? Did you really...kill Chihiro?"

His lips parted but nothing came out. "I...I...I-I-I..." his tone was heavy with so much pain, I felt it prick and sink into my own skin. 

"I didn't kill anyone!" 

"You've been all over me, judging everything I say, putting words in my mouth." He exploded into an enraged rant, clenching his quivering fist. His fist was brought down against the surface of his stand, rattling the podium and almost tipping it over with the immense force. "What gives you the right to treat me like a goddamn criminal?"

"Y-Yeah!" snapped Kiyotaka, instantaneously jumping to Mondo's side in order to defend him. "He would never do something like that! This is a false accusation!"

Kyoko gave them a brief hum of ponder, admitting, "It's true, my reasoning on that is pretty shaky."

With a heavy sigh, Celeste gave a slight shake of her head. "Well," she began, exhaustion lacing her words. "This does present us with a problem. It seems we are all out of leads."

Hearing everyone's enervation and unease, Hifumi faintly chuckled to himself in a tone much deeper than usual. "My time has nearly come." He bellowed with a clever grin. Without waiting for any reactions from the rest of us, he reached into one of the pockets of his oversized cardigan and slipped out something into his hands.

When I leaned in to get a closer look, I realized it was an e-handbook. 

"Hmm?" trilled Syo. "What do you have there?"

"It happens to be an e-handbook." announced Hifumi, holding up the tablet higher into the air so that everyone could see. "I found it laying on the ground, so I scooped it up."

My weary eyes scanned across the room as I inquired, "Does this belong to anyone here?" No such responses; each student shook their heads and held up their own respective handbooks in their hands for me to see. I could feel my own resting in the right pocket of my jacket, seemingly growing heavier with each inhale I took. If this handbook didn't belong to anyone present, it could only mean one thing. "Then this must be Chihiro's, right?"

Aoi's once fatigued stature perked up immediately at the news, a more luminous look shining on her face. "Then it must hold some clue about the culprit, right?" She exclaimed, rocking back and forth on the balls of her feet.

It appeared that Aoi and Hifumi had now traded attitudes, as now _he_ was the one drooping in dismay. "Well, that's what I was hoping." A hefty exhale escaped from his chest, voicing his disappointment. "But it's busted. It won't even turn on."

"I imagine the culprit broke it to get rid of any evidence after the murder." Celeste interjected, cupping her chin with her slender fingers. It did seem plausible that the killer got rid of their handbook, alongside the duffel bag and tracksuit. 

Byakuya's eyebrows furrowed into a crease. "That's odd." He remarked. "I didn't think the handbooks were quite so...fragile."

"You're right!" As if on instinct, my head jerked around to face Monokuma, perched on top his throne with a giddy tone beneath his shrill voice. "They're not! They're totally waterproof and shock-resistant! It can withstand thousands of pounds of pressure, and can even last in extremely high temperatures! It would take an awful lot to break one!"

"And yet," gestured Celeste, arguably disagreeing with his egotistic pride. "This one does appear to be broken. As is Leon's, sitting useless in the main hall. For all your confidence, that is a remarkably high failure rate."

Monokuma merely giggled into his paws at her detrimental criticism, his monochrome shoulders shaking up and down with glee. "Do you think there might some kind of mystery in there somewhere?" He crooned, prompting us for an answer we didn't even know. "How, precisely, did the handbooks get broken?"

An ominous feeling of deja vu clouded my mind, thickening my thoughts and slowing my consciousness. Those words sounded so familiar, it was like I had heard them said in the exact same way before. Monokuma preaching about broken handbooks, and how they absolutely won't break unless a certain spot was hit.

"You already told us before that the handbook has one weak point, didn't you?" I slowly began to recollect pieces of our conversation earlier this day. Monokuma flinched at my response, clearly not expecting me to get it right on the first try.

"Ugh, you remember that?" He cried out in a blend of irritation and surprise. His furry head suddenly drooped with shame, chin hitting his chest as he mumbled, "S-Sure, maybe I let that slip, but I never told anyone what the weak point actually was!"

Sakura frowned at his disheartened remark. "But if the handbook is supposed to never break, and two of them broke in quick succession..." her voice trailed off as the realization slowly began to sink into all of our minds, staining our heads with truths.

"Then we can only assume that someone's figured out is weakness." finished Kyoko, nodding along with reason. Her head turned to stare down Monokuma in a silent war, demanding an explanation with only her menacing eyes. I thought I could see the bear shy the slightest bit away from her gaze. "You know what the weakness is, right Monokuma? So, what is it?"

"Huh?" His head cocked to one side in almost a taunting way of questioning her. "You're asking me?"

Kyoko crossed her arms over her chest, beginning to run low on patience. "I think it's a necessary piece of information if you want this to be a fair trial." She argued with a tone built from steel.

Monokuma let out a weight sigh of defeat, although it seemed more fake than it did genuine. "Fine, I guess I can tell you." He grumbled. "But I don't wanna see any of you breaking your own handbooks after this! That would be just awful!"

"Why would we break our own handbooks?" Aoi rolled her eyes in exasperation, growing more vexed. "Just tell us!"

"Okay, okay!" Monokuma threateningly clawed his paws in the air to dismiss us, even though it was just Aoi talking. "Then allow me to make a special announcement! The weak point of my cutting-edge e-handbook is heat!"

"I flippin' knew it!" Hifumi's abrupt, voluminous voice almost startled me as much as the words that came from his mouth. My head instantly snapped around to the side as I gaped wide eyed at his confident glower. I blinked a few times out of pure bewilderment.

"You knew it?" I echoed.

Hifumi's head bobbed up and down in affirmation. "Yeah!" He started to inform. "'Cause I found the handbook laying on the floor of the sauna!"

The only reason I could conjure for why a handbook would be inside the sauna, was that it was purposely put their by the killer. If what Kyoko had claimed was accurate, then somebody among us figured out this hidden weakness beforehand- by accident or by intention, I didn't know- and tried to break the gadget using this information. Everything fell into place.

"If you found Chihiro's handbook in the sauna," I elaborated my thinking the best I could. "Then the killer must've been purposely trying to raise its temperature in order to break it."

"Meaning the culprit somehow knew its weakness." concurred Sakura.

Aoi wasn't completely certain of this hypothesis. "But how'd they find out?" She wondered out loud, a slight frown bending on her face. "Monokuma said he didn't tell anyone, right?"

"What if they found out by accident?" proposed Kyoko. Her gloved fingers reached up to cup her chin as she pondered this thought for a while. "What if the killer took their own handbook into the sauna, not knowing its weakness, and it broke? They'd realize it was broken, of course, and it wouldn't be hard to figure out why. And once they had Chihiro's handbook, they knew they had an easy way to dispose of it."

By the time I had fully recognized the theory, I could no longer breathe.

Someone who unconsciously took their own handbook into the sauna, then accidentally broke it. At first glance, it seemed like an outrageous conjecture. Who could've or would've brought their own e-handbook into such a place full of humidity and heat? Purposely bringing their respective device into a dangerous area was out of the question; it just seemed too appalling. Whatever happened, the killer must've brought something into the sauna that had contained the handbook inside. And, without them knowing, it malfunctioned from the intense temperatures.

And I knew exactly who it was.

"I won't say it's not possible, but," Byakuya's voice faltered and paused as he tried to rethink the speculation in his head. "Who would have done something like that? I don't know of anyone who took their handbook into the sauna."

It was hard to choose between hopes. If I spoke up, the culprit's hope would shatter into a miserable end. If I remained silent, our own will would break, and we would tumble into a painful shared death for all. One life traded for another. That's just how it worked in this demented game.

When I chose to open my mouth, I instantly wished I hadn't.

"I might know someone who did." I uttered.

Gasps and murmurs of shock swarmed the room and swallowed the hall until it only echoed of despair. Voices and unintelligible remarks made me wince inside my own skin, and I felt myself hold in a breath. From the corner of my eye, I could see Kiyotaka's shoulders tremble, like he was attempting his hardest not to scream. He knew the answer too.

"Wh-Who was it?" Yasuhiro asked nervously, as if he desired and dreaded the truth at the same time. I knew that feeling all too well.

My inhale was shaky, but my exhale was even more weak. I had to force myself to look straight at the killer.

Straight at Mondo Owada.

"Mondo," It felt as if someone else was speaking in my place, and I was just merely watching as an audience. "Your handbook got broken in the sauna, didn't it?"

His breathing halted to a brutal stop, his face becoming more deathly by the minute. Sweat ran cold against his flushed skin, a clue of the instinctive terror that laid behind his wide, trembling eyes. I could see his chest heave with unspilt panic, unspoken words. His voice was hoarse and rough, inhuman. "Wh-Wh-What?" He rasped.

"Why?" Kiyotaka yelled, choking on his own tragic demands. The sheer pain in his cracking voice stabbed directly through my heart, piercing it until it fell away into a million bloody pieces. "Why do you keep accusing him?"

"Mondo and Taka had an endurance contest in the sauna not too long ago, remember?" I tried to continue, despite the atrocious ache that clung to my chest. "And for the contest, Mondo just so happened to keep his school uniform on. But he didn't realize that he'd also left his handbook in one of his uniform pockets. And when it was all over, Mondo discovered that taking your handbook into the sauna could easily destroy it."

A growl escaped from Mondo's gritted teeth, yet no words of refutation accompanied it. Sensing the lack of response, Kiyotaka immediately leapt to his defense; he almost seemed more horrified by the reveal than the actual culprit, even though he didn't have a single thing to do with the case.

"N-No, wait, hold on!" He shouted, his words growing more hurried as his panic increased. "You've got it all wrong! He would never kill anyone!" His face was ghastly. His hands slammed on the wooden podium in front of him, emitting such a loud echo, multiple people winced out of instinct. "I don't accept this! Show me the proof! The actual, solid proof!"

There was no name belonging to this feeling of mine. Betrayal, hurt, infuriation, and above all, fear. I hated this tendril of despair that nurtured deep within my heart, poisoning the rest of my body until everything was only numb. Once was already enough with Leon's case, but a second time? I no longer felt confident that I could retain my sanity.

"Well, let's test Junko's assertion," offered Kyoko, her words cutting a clean line through the thick, tense conflict. It was enough to force everyone in complete silence, awaiting her next thoughts. "If what she says is correct, then Mondo," she turned to face him on her left, their statures contrasting completely, "you broke your own handbook."

"Well my goddamn handbook works just fine!" He snarled, a bark behind his rough tone. 

"Can we see it, then?" I asked. "The handbook you have right now. Is it really yours?"

Partially, I was just hoping that he'd show us a functioning e-handbook and confirm it for a fact, and all our accusations would fall false. Every fiber of my being refused to believe that Mondo had actually killed someone, had actually killed Chihiro, one of our dear friends. It was too heinous to physically believe. 

But, of course, I was always asking for too much.

Much to my misery, he flinched out of pure surprise, caught off guard by a question he hoped no one would ask. His frantic eyes were spilling with raw terror. "The fuck's that supposed to mean?" He cursed.

Against my own will, my theory had been proven correct. All this time, that broken e-handbook lying in the main hall had been nagging and bothering me. I had always just thought that it was Leon's, as the other two belonged to the other dead students, and his execution had the capability to break it. However, Monokuma himself had informed me that even a thousand baseballs couldn't have done a single scratch onto one of his gadgets. Those two contradictions were the basis of my speculation: the dead device on the first floor wasn't Leon's at all.

I had to swallow my words before I voiced them out loud. "The broken handbook that was in the main hall," I found myself blurting out. "Isn't that one actually yours?"

Kiyotaka backed up from his stand until his back hit flat against the wall behind him. "W-What the heck are you talking about?" He fumed, his chest beginning to heave hysterically. His words were choppy with rapid breaths and unstable exhales, like he was experiencing a full panic attack at this moment.

I was already too far in to suddenly fall silent. "What I mean is," I tried my best to avert my eyes in order to prevent myself from seeing Kiyotaka's frenzied state. "I think Mondo swapped his handbook out for one that actually works. I think he took Leon's handbook and replaced it with his own. Monokuma said himself that Leon's handbook never should have broken."

"That's right!" called Monokuma from across the circle. "The punishment it suffered wasn't nearly enough to destroy it!"

"So then," Celeste commented with a finger to her lips. "The broken handbook in the main hall is actually Mondo's. Which would mean that the handbook Mondo has right now is actually Leon's, yes?"

Aoi's head tipped to one side in puzzlement. "But doesn't that violate the school regulation that says loaning out your handbook is prohibited?" She asked with a furrowed brow.

"Well," Monokuma began to divulge in his own explanation. "Here's how I look at it: there is a rule about loaning your handbook to another student. But if they're dead, they're not a student!" He leaned back into his chair, crossing his black leg over his white. "It's kind of a grey area, I admit, but no worries! If anything, it just makes things more interesting!"

This entire trial had worn me out to a full extent. I didn't even realize how tense my shoulders were until I released it all with a droop of my arms. That's when I recognized the pain in my heart was just as heavy as the ache in my bones. "Well, Mondo?" My own voice echoed of hollow defeat. "If I'm wrong about this, you're welcome to say so."

I would give anything for him to prove my mistake.

I couldn't meet his gaze directly, but I knew that he had run out of defenses with only the sound of his intense breathing. Ultimately, he had given up. "S-Son of a bitch!" I heard him spit out, those words ringing dejection.

"W-What's wrong, bro?" Kiyotaka pleaded with dread in his voice. There was a nervous laugh accompanying his sentences, stubborn to reject the truth. "Come on, tell her she's wrong!" His head jerked around to face me, and I could see the absolute denial resting in his broad eyes. "You _are_ wrong! You _have_ to be wrong! You need actual, solid proof! Without proof, yo-you can't pin any of this on him!"

"Well, fine!" Everything, all of my pent up exasperation, my growing horror, my increasing despair, erupted out in one single shout. "Let's just check each of our handbooks right now. Once we'll do that, we'll-"

"We don't gotta do that."

His voice. It was so soft, so faint. Ironically enough, it was what finally smashed my soul into a thousand bits and pieces. It was only a tone used to admit an eventual defeat; Mondo had finally given up.

"Huh?" I almost stuttered from the immense incredulity that racked my chest. There he was, standing just a few feet away from me, face full of utter regret.

"Yeah." He muttered, then nodded his head as if to confirm it for himself. "Yeah. I did it. I...killed them."

Kiyotaka was only two stands away from where I stood, but there could be a mile between us and I could still hear his pain. His mouth opened, but his throat was too parched to aid any words. The look of absolute fear was drawn across his face, skin paling and eyes becoming filmy with unkept tears. 

"Bro?" His question was more delicate than the thinnest glass. "Bro, what are you saying?"

Mondo's fist clenched to contain all of his emotion, trembling in place until skin broke beneath his nails. He shook his head, gritting his teeth. "I got no choice, man. After hearing all that, I gotta just...give up." His gaze lifted so I could see the ache welling up in his eyes. They drifted over to the throne standing proudly in front of the circle. "Go ahead, Monokuma. Get it over with."

His reaction was completely different from Leon's, but it still hurt in the exact same spot in my heart. For some reason, hearing Mondo just give it all up, ready for his doomed fate, sent an even more excruciating pain through my veins until my face grew tepid with emotion. This was the end, wasn't it?

"Roger that!" Monokuma's cheery voice wasn't helping with lifting the mood at all. In fact, it made it much worse.

Kiyotaka's breathing was so heavy, I swore the entire courtroom could hear it squeeze out of his ached lungs. It was then I finally saw the tears escaping his eyes, tracing and staining his cheek. "W-Wait! Hold on-"

"No waiting! No holding on!" Monokuma sang, bouncing up and down in his seat in such an inhumane excitement. "Time for the moment we've all been waiting for! Grab your lever and give it a yank!"

As if on cue, the same few levers arose to the wooden surface of my podium, commanding my hands to grasp their heads and pull it. For a split second, I hesitated and pulled away, horror thumping in my chest until I could hear blood roar inside my ears. This was the final act. Hours upon hours of debate all lead to this single decision, lying at the very tips of my fingers. Once I tugged on the lever, there was no going back. It guaranteed the unlawful death of Mondo, along with enough trauma to last another lifetime. Was I even prepared for any of that?

I had seen it once before. I couldn't possibly do it again.

But at least this time, there was no struggle. There were no shrieks and begs of release. There were no desperate excuses from the true killer. Choosing would be what he ultimately wanted for all of us; we couldn't sacrifice all of our lives for someone prepared to die. 

"Who will you elect as the blackened this time around?" Monokuma's voice dropped back into the dramatic, suspenseful tone he had used in the last trial. It was like he was playing a game, a game with our hopes and lives and dreams. "Will you make the right choice, or the dreadfully wrong one?"

As Monokuma's joyous hurrays and Kiyotaka's desolate screams echoed inside what was left of my head, I reached out a single, trembly arm. 

I voted Mondo Owada, the Ultimate Biker Gang Leader, as the blackened.

"What's it gonna be?" hyped Monokuma, pumping a fist into the air as more and more votes began to dock in. All around me, I could hear the creaky noises of levers being pulled as each student reluctantly made their decision. "What's it gonna be?"

I had to close my eyes, holding my breath in pure anticipation until my lungs collapsed with fatigue. The horrific end of this miserable Class Trial, billowing with secrets and treachery and blood, was nearing much quicker than I could ever hope. My head was screaming with thoughts and guilt alike. My fingers gripped the sides of the podium in front of me.

I had just indirectly killed another person with my own two hands.

"Uh-oh," Monokuma's voice was enough for me to unwillingly pry my eyes open, and I almost gasped out loud for fresh air to breathe. "This time it looks like you got it right again! Yes, it is so. The blackened that killed Chihiro Fujisaki was Mondo Owada!" He giggled out of satisfaction at our end result, clutching his stomach and falling back into his high chair.

I didn't know what terrified me more, Monokuma's insane laughter or Mondo's dead silence.

"By the way," added Monokuma, halting his maniac chuckles for a brief second to speak. "The vote was _not_ unanimous. Taka chose the wrooong answer! I can't believe you'd vote for yourself just to save Mondo!"

Kiyotaka's mouth opened and closed again, parched of any more rebuttals. All he had left were painful denials of the horrifying truth.

"I-I refuse to believe it..." He rasped, voice croaking of agony. His sweaty back suddenly met with the wall again, the arms held in front of him trembling with fried nerves. "There's no way...no way he would kill someone!"

Mondo's hand finally went slack against the side of his body, his arm hanging limply of grief. "Sorry." Was all he could muster to say.

"Wh-Why are you apologizing?" yelled Kiyotaka. He threw himself off of the wall in a harrowing heave, stumbling over his own two feet. He was so uncoordinated at that moment, I couldn't believe he was the same pristine Kiyotaka Ishimaru I met just a week ago. On clumsy, throbbing steps, he weaved his way towards Mondo's stand and snatched the collar of his biker jacket, shaking it and screaming, "Why? Why why why why why why? WHY?"

Over and over again, until "why" didn't even sound like a word anymore.

"Why did you do it?"

The room only echoed with his harsh cries and Mondo's soundlessness.

"Since Mondo has now chosen to plead the fifth," mused Monokuma, clearly feeding an entertainment in our misery. "I guess I'll explain why. This is a story of a promise. A secret. A betrayal. Ooh, the despair!"

If not for me gripping onto my shaky knees with my fists, I most likely would've punched him.

Monokuma cleared his throat dramatically, although he didn't really need to, sinking into a far more serious tone. "Now, I don't want to speak over Chihiro and reveal the true reasons why they chose to appear as a girl, when they were really born a guy. All I'm gonna say is that ever since they were born, Chihiro had an extreme inferiority complex of being weak. Being a feeble boy in this society had so much stigma in it, that they kept it hidden as a secret that would only bring them pain. They couldn't possibly confront that reality. It was a reminder of how weak they truly were.

"And when the lovely and hateful Monokuma announced the revealing of the embarrassing memories, Chihiro's secret was one of them!" All of a sudden, Monokuma's shrill tone leapt straight from grave to merry in a matter of seconds. "Of course, _I_ thought it was gonna pummel them into despair! Being have to forcibly confront the biggest weakness of your life was the most despair-inducing thing of all, right?

"Well, annoyingly enough, it had the complete opposite effect on Chihiro. Apparently, the threat was what ultimately motivated them to finally get stronger. They no longer wanted to cower away from their largest foible. They wanted to face that fear, that weakness, head on! If they eventually become strong enough, then even the mention of their shame wouldn't effect them at all!

"And so, Chihiro made a commitment to begin exercising. Of course, they couldn't possibly get advice from girls; it would risk their secret being exposed. So, they went to the next most reliable guy, Mondo!"

A pained noise of guilt pried out from Mondo's throat. "Yeah, it was me."

Monokuma howled with a wolfish laughter. "Yep! Mondo had made such a big deal about how important promises were to him! So Chihiro probably figured that even if he found out their secret, his honor would make him keep it."

With crossed arms, Kyoko turned to face Mondo on her left. "So then, that must be why Mondo did what he did- to keep the promise he'd made to Chihiro."

"So," My breath forced its way out from my chest in a weighty exhale. "That's why Mondo carried Chihiro from the boys locker room into the girls locker room?"

"Wasn't that to cover up what he'd done?" Even Hifumi's voice bore an uneasy exhaustion and wear. 

Kyoko gave her head a swift nod of acknowledgement, considering the objection. "That could have been part of it, but I don't think it was the main reason," she concluded. "The real purpose was to keep the promise he made with Chihiro. If the body was left in the boys locker room, most of us would begin to suspect their identity, their secret. The same secret that hurt Chihiro for so long. Mondo tried to at least prevent it from getting out by moving them to the girls locker room and breaking their handbook."

"Then," I was utterly breathless from the shock of reality. "Mondo did all that to keep the promise he'd made to Chihiro...who he'd also killed?"

One tear, then a second, until salty waterfalls began to cascade down Kiyotaka's grief-stricken face. "Why..." his frail voice finally shattered and crumpled into a mixture of deep sobs and heaving breaths. "Would he...do that?" He shook Mondo by the collar once again, with much more vigor this time. "The more I hear you talk, the more I don't understand! I mean, you guys trusted each other, right?" 

When he got no such response, Kiyotaka's trembling hands slowly released their tight grip on the black fabric. He had lost enough strength that he couldn't bear to hold onto anything. "So..why did you...?"

An era of silence trailed after his broken words, stretching for seeming eons until Mondo finally spoke again. It was so soft, so fragile, I had almost missed it completely. It felt almost _too_ soft, _too_ fragile, the complete contrast of Mondo's character. 

"Because," he nearly whispered out his answer. "No matter what, I...I couldn't let anyone know."

I wasn't even sure if I heard him correctly until Kyoko's affirmations confirmed my comprehension. "So, that's what triggered it after all," she verified with a slight nod of understanding. "The possibility of having your embarrassing memories and secrets exposed, that is."

"Th-That's impossible!" cried Kiyotaka, eyes wide with a pure refusal to believe. He looked quite offended. "Nothing could have been that bad! Something he didn't want anyone to know, even if it meant killing someone?"

"Oh, but it is that bad!" Monokuma interjected with a small, demonic giggle. "That embarrassing memory, that secret he didn't want anyone to know. You know what Mondo did?"

I wished and prayed and hoped to remove myself from this conversation. There he went again, having absolutely no regard for human life or basic morals. The least he could do was spare his dignity and remain it a secret, but Monokuma was too low of a beast to even do that. My stomach churned with the permanent sensation of unease.

"He killed his own brother!"

Why did my breathing stop?

"Gh!" A strangled noise of infuriation escaped from Mondo's lips in a harsh spat. 

No remorse. No consent Monokuma had not a single sign of remorse nor consent in his devilish tone as he began to preach once again. "Mondo Owada, the Ultimate Biker Gang Leader, makes all the hoodlums and riff-raff across the country tremble. But the only reason he had the choice to join a gang in the first place was because of a certain someone. 

"Mondo's older brother's name was Daiya Owada. Mondo had nothing but respect for him. It was because of Daiya that Mondo ever got on a motorcycle. Mondo's brother was his only family growing up; he was the only one Mondo could trust, or respect. He wanted to measure up to his big brother, so he imitated him in everything he did. He was the epitome of the starry-eyed kid brother.

"Meanwhile, the charismatic older brother had put together a local motorcycle gang, and before anyone knew it, it had grown into the biggest biker gang in the country. Daiya, the older brother, number one in the gang. And his number two, his younger brother, Mondo. In the beginning, everything was just so nice!" Monokuma dragged out the word "so" in an irritated, disgusted tonality of voice. 

"But when Mondo started to think about how he would have to take over the gang from his brother someday, his brother's greatness, his reputation, began to gnaw on Mondo's very soul! Almost every day, Mondo heard the gossip and whispers of the other members of the gang. Which is why he wanted more than anything to become stronger than Daiya!

"So, on the night of his amazing brother's retirement ceremony, Mondo challenged him to a street race!" Monokuma's once cheery, bright voice suddenly dropped to a low, theatrical tone. "But during the race, tragedy struck. The kid brother pushed ahead with reckless abandon, eager for victory, and dashed into oncoming traffic. Speeding after him, Daiya stepped in front of it all and saved his brother's life! For only the cost of his own, though.

"Laying in his kid brother's arms, the older brother delivered his final words. Of course, he knew it was his brother's fault, but Daiya never blamed him for what happened. Instead, he made a promise. A promise between men; Mondo promised to his dying brother that he'd hold the gang together, the one only they two built, no matter what. That was the night that would forever change Mondo's life.

"He decided to hide the truth of what happened from everyone else in the gang. In order to keep the gang together, and keep the promise he made to his brother, he could never admit to anyone that it was his own weakness that had caused the accident! He fed himself lies over and over again, lies that poisoned his mind with the belief that he was strong. However, when our killing game began, he realized that no matter how tough he pretended to be, he was just another weakling that could die in an instant.

"And then, the lovely, the hateful Monokuma announced the revealing of the embarrassing secrets. I had no problem letting it fly loose, but apparently, Mondo did!" chirped Monokuma, cackling silently to himself up on that throne.

By the time he finally finished explaining, I was so short on oxygen that I nearly fainted. Nothing I heard made any sense whatsoever; it all went in one ear and out the other. Perhaps my mind was too frazzled from the trial to comprehend anything, but there was not a thing I could believe. Chihiro's true desire. Mondo's history of murder. It sounded like something made up from a video game, not a reality in real life.

A shaky, weight exhale released from Mondo's lungs. He couldn't meet Kiyotaka's fractured eyes of betrayal, so his gaze lowered until it only focused on his quivering fist.

"N-No matter what, I couldn't let the other gang members find out." He managed to rasp, watching as his fingers clenched together and quivered. "If that happened, everything would have been ruined. Everything me and my brother had worked to create woulda been destroyed. His death...all the guilt I'd been carrying around. It woulda been for nothing."

"Mondo..." I tried to utter his name in hopes of somehow reassuring him, but my efforts were fruitless. I couldn't even find the strength to assure myself.

He held up a single tired hand to dismiss me. "It's...okay. I thought I could handle it on my own, I really did. But when I saw what Monokuma had on me, my head filled up with a kind of fuzzy uneasiness, and just started swirlin' around. I couldn't handle it at all. I wasn't sure what to think or say. But after a while, that fuzzy uneasiness turned itself into a rock-hard lump of anxiety, way down in my stomach!" His voice started off weary, but as more and more memories of his suffering resurfaced, Mondo's words became rushed and broken. 

Anger, hurt, misery, despair. I could hear it all in just his words.

"And it was right around then that Chihiro asked me to start working out with them. And right there, I...they told me a secret." His chest heaved with painful, forced sentences. "You've heard them, right? They've always wanted to be stronger. And they...they told me they really wanted to change, destroy the lies they'd been livin' in and face their greatest weakness. Their words were like a knife in my gut; I felt like they were exposing the lie I'd been living myself. I was...jealous." Both fists were clenched as he relived that excruciating memory.

"I was jealous of Chihiro's strength. They had the strength to face their own weakness, to try and overcome it!" He gritted his teeth, and I could see the tears glistening in his eyes, yet they never leaked out. "It was the kind of strength I've never had. So I was jealous of them. And that jealousy...broke me. That jealousy turned into anger, and before I knew it, I passed out."

The tear that splashed and blotched the surface of my podium surprised me. When I cautiously reached a hand to brush against my cheek, I finally realized that I had been crying. 

The despair that engulfed my entire body made me so numb, I couldn't even feel a single thing. All I knew was sorrow. 

Born into despair, falling into despair, succumbing into despair. That was what had become of my shattered world.

Mondo choked on his own words before he could barely say them. "When I woke up again, they were laying at my feet," he swallowed a lump of guilt in his throat, forcing all of his horror down into the pit of his stomach. "Covered in blood. I had the dumbbell in my hand...and I was just staring at them...down on the ground."

"H-Hey-" Kiyotaka tried, reaching a trembly hand out for Mondo. No longer did he bother and try to stop the tears from running down his face; he let them stain his skin with transparent colored misery. Heavy, bone crushing sobs hacked away at his body until he could no longer breathe. Powerless, he watched behind terrified eyes as Mondo confessed the very thing he despised to hear.

"I...killed them." said Mondo. 

"I killed Chihiro."

There was no conversation exchanged this time between the students. Unlike last time with Leon's case, complete and utter silence echoed within the vast walls of the courtroom. Anguish had planted seeds of sorrow inside the hearts of everyone present, fertilizing plants of despair whose roots dragged down our hope. Even if I wanted to say something, I couldn't.

"Even after all this time," Mondo mourned through clenched teeth. His broad shoulders shook up and down, preparing to spill every emotion that had built its way inside of him. "I'm still just as weak as I've always been! And thanks to that, I did something I can never take back."

Mondo Owada.

On the very first day I'd met him, he almost punched me.

I had only seen him as a naturally aggressive man, who didn't cower from confrontation or fights at all. His anger easily bested his patience. I would have never even guessed it was all just an act. An act to hide and shield away his true weakness. He was weak enough to act strong. It was just so ironic, wasn't it?

"I understand you, Mondo," came Monokuma's voice, full of forged desolation and pain. His head drooped low against his chest, almost mockingly. "I know what it's like to be inferior to others. I know what it's like to be constantly compared to an outstanding sibling."

"Please, just shut the fuck up." I reprimanded, but my voice hung heavy. It sounded more like a plea than it did an insult.

My attempts at quieting him were all in vain, as he abruptly dropped the act and chittered away. His monochrome paws covered his mouth with a flighty snicker. "Your faces, they're all so full of despair!" He prattled with an amused grin in his sickening words. "Do you see hope anywhere in there? 'Cause I sure don't!"

"Y-You bastard!" swore Kiyotaka, yet his tears were weighing him down in achieving a successful offense. Stumbling over his own quivering legs, he swore, "Just shut up, you son of a bitch! Go ahead, say that again, I dare you!"

Monokuma's giggles only increased in insanity and volume at his screams. "Sorry, I can't do that right now!" He sang in a repulsive cheery tone, oblivious to all the suffering and agony unfolding in front him. "Because the time for punishing is fast approaching!"

"P-Punishing?" I could not even hear my own voice; it was too weak, too soft, too disbelieving to be perceived. This couldn't be happening again. I couldn't see another friend of mine be punished. No, not ever. 

Every last drop of color drained from Kiyotaka's face. "You mean...execution?"

"That's what I promised you, right?" Monokuma's head tilted innocently to the side, ignoring the absolute despair those words haunted us with. "The blackened that disturbs the peace will be punished."

My blood ran cold.

"H-Hold on!" Kiyotaka's desperate screams and hopeless wails fell against deaf ears.

"Now, then!" howled Monokuma, clutching his stomach as he roared away with the most manic laughter I'd ever heard in my entire life. It was one I knew would terrorize me even long after death, all the way down from the depths of Hell itself. "I've prepared a very special punishment for Mondo Owada, the Ultimate Biker Gang Leader!"

"N-No! I said wait!" I couldn't bear to watch as Kiyotaka attempted to shove away Monokuma's giggling figure, only to ultimately trip over his own hurried feet and crumple onto the ground, his broken sobs beating his body down into the earth until he no longer had the strength to lift himself up. "Wait! J-Just a few more minutes, please!"

All the begs and cries in the world couldn't make Monokuma even consider the thought of holding back.

Monokuma cackled over and over and over again, until his own lungs collapsed from too much pleasure. "Let's give it everything we've got! It's punishment time!"

And he pressed the red button.

游戏结束.

Spinning.

Around and around it went, a circular panel adorned with a spiral pattern, painted a solid black and white. What first seemed like an eternal dizzying whirlpool of monochromatic hues, slowly dwindled down in speed until two distinctive sides of the panel were visible to the eye. One was a lighter shade, the other darker. The lighter, hope. The darker, despair. It came as no surprise when the dimmer of the two came to light.

Adjacent to the whirling panel, appeared to be a mini carnival of sorts. A billowing tent, pitched up by long skewers budding vibrantly toned flags, was decorated with elegant stripes of crimson and ivory. A cheap golden crown plate hung from the front of the tent, the face of a vicious tiger carved onto the wooden surface. Balloons of rainbow fluttered and danced out from the sides of the tent. Above, streamers and banners of different vivid colors dangled from the sky. 

And at the very front of it all, was a sphere cage molded from solid steel and weaved with sturdy metal. It was a cage large enough to hold even the largest creatures captive. On either sides of the enclosure were ornamentations depicting two vigorous tigers, jaws still wide midroar.

All around were the distant cheers and delighted whistles of an invisible amused crowd, harmonious voices belonging to no throats.

As the circular panel's spinning died to a complete halt, a monstrous motorcycle bearing colors that were anything but pleasing, arose from the Earth. The vehicle was loud, both in design and volume. The paint on the motorcycle was untouched, clear signs of its newly youth. Neon greens and pinks and oranges were splashed onto the sides of the automobile, creating an appalling design. The dusky engines growled like a ferocious, hungry beast, thirsty for blood to spill. Clouds of exhaust escaped from the bike and into the suffocating air, heavy and laced with doom. 

In the seat at the very front was the monochrome bear, paws fixated onto the sleek ink handles of the motorcycle. Behind it, a boy with deep brown hair, strapped to the back seat of the vehicle with his hands tied to the face of his own chair. The utter look of desperation was drawn across the disturbed face of the boy as he watched the cage in front of him peel to an open behind trembling eyes.

The gate that had once sealed the enclosure shut grumbled and groaned as it was slowly lifted to reveal the interior of the cage. There was not a single thing to be discovered inside; only the final despair of death awaited the boy.

A single white bear paw revved the howling engine of the machine, gearing it up to a cacophonous start. Slamming a foot on the pedal, the bike snarled with the increasing tensity, smoke spitting out from its back engines. With a bloody, brutal shriek, the motorcycle began to speed away at the bear's very command. 

The bicycle swerved drunkenly to one side, staggering and choking as it attempted to adjust to the sudden shift in momentum. Kicking away with a tornado of dust, the motorcycle's misguided path shot straight into the direction of the deathly cage. The wheels drilled into the solid, cold ground, leaving harsh skid marks as the bike's pace hastened with the decreasing time. 

Closer and closer it approached. The opening of the cage seemed like hungry mouth, eager to consume the robust life of the guilt-ridden young boy. The poles were like teeth, the cell a jaw. The boy's eyes squeezed shut with anticipation and tensed with dread, yet not a word spilled from his lips. He instead waited in silence as he was forcibly nearing the cage of death.

Just mere seconds before the bike entered the enclosure, the bear's hands released their firm grip on the handles, falling away and tumbling to the ground unscathed, leaving only the boy to remain fastened onto the motorcycle. He could only sit helpless as death swallowed him like a monster, and the vehicle slipped inside.

Like a grisly rollercoaster from another hellish dimension, the motorcycle spun and echoed inside the narrow interior of the cage, bouncing off the steel woven walls and slamming into the solid sides. Up, down. Up, down. Around and around he went, still tightly secured with heavy chains of imprisonment. Nausea grabbed a hold of the atmosphere and choked it free of tranquility. The bike only revolved faster and faster, the rate exceeding the limit of the human race, until the cage glowered with neon and crackled with electricity. The air sparkled and cackled with friction as the enclosure's faint humming exploded into a shrill cry. The boy was still whirling inside the cell.

It could have been only a few minutes, it could have been hours. Time seemed to evaporate off the face of the planet. The motorcycle never appeared to pause once for breath, even when the boy's screams had long died into the jarring, ghastly air. It just kept rotating and spinning, so fast that even those who were watching from a side could feel the effects of the punishment. It took six eons until the sky finally erupted into the most scintillating burst of light, engulfing every single thing left in a brilliant dazzle of luminosity.

The motorcycle was empty when it cluttered to the very bottom the cage.

There was not even a body left to bury.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> again sorry for the extra long chapter
> 
> i really dislike chihiro's gender discourse so i tried my best to make it neutral


End file.
